Blood Bound
by Shananigans10
Summary: Hermione and Draco make a huge mistake one night during their final year at Hogwarts that will force them to change who they are and the direction their lives were heading. Where will it take them? How will they manage? I do not own Harry Potter or anything affiliated with it- I make no money from this story. Characters are kind of OOC as the story progresses. ORIGINAL PLOT.
1. Chapter 1

"Hermione, we have to go!"

She took one last look around her bedroom at the Burrow to ensure that she wasn't leaving anything behind, knowing she would never return, and then rushed down the stairs and out the door.

Mrs. Weasley was standing there looking extremely harassed, they never had a smooth return to school, but at least with the twins living in Diagon Alley they weren't here to cause a ruckus.

"I'm sorry, Mrs. Weasley! I was just making sure I had everything."

She rushed into the car, squeezing herself in beside Harry and slamming the door.

The tension inside the car was thick as water. Harry and Ginny had been fighting recently and Hermione knew that Harry was considering breaking it off with Ginny before the war, he didn't want her to become a liability. Ginny hadn't been told about it but Hermione thought that she could sense something big was going to happen, causing her to be tense and angry. Harry just worried about everyone's safety all the time and always felt extremely guilty when anything bad happened.

Problems of being the Chosen One.

Hermione had been living at the Burrow for most of their holidays because she had a feeling that the war was going to be happening any time, and she didn't want her parents to get caught in the crossfire all because of her. She modified their memories to ensure they wouldn't remember having a child and they promptly sold their house and moved to Australia.

Hermione moved into the Burrow a week after their holidays began and she and Ron started dating the week after that, unfortunately, their relationship was just not meant to be.

Ron was clingy and possessive. He was also pushy and demanding.

Not something Hermione was okay with, and she was surprised that she had actually thought at one point it would ever work out for them. Hermione couldn't put her finger on it, but she felt like there was someone out there that was actually meant to be with her. She knew it was a crazy notion but she couldn't shake the feeling.

Hermione and Ron's relationship lasted a whopping month and a half before she couldn't handle him anymore. She was glad that their relationship never went any farther than basic snogging, she wouldn't have wanted to give herself to someone who was so selfish and… forgetful.

"Hermione?"

She was brought out of her musings by Harry, who she looked at questioningly - a look that was being returned to her.

"Are you… going to get out? We have a train to catch, you know?"

Hermione whipped her head around and realized they were at Kings Cross. She laughed nervously and opened the door, quickly stepping out onto the sidewalk. She grabbed her trunk and Mrs. Weasley escorted the two Weasley children, Harry, and Hermione into the station, tension still thick in the air.

Once they made it through onto platform 9 ¾ Ginny gave Harry a beseeching look and quickly turned away, walking in the opposite direction.

Tensions were high between everyone these days, it seemed. The war was still on the horizon, Dumbledore was sending Harry letters at least once a week, and Hermione knew they were having private lessons of some sort this year. She didn't know anything about them yet, but knew Harry would keep her informed.

Ron, Harry and Hermione seemed to be drifting apart, forgetting how to be happy together with the stress that was upon their shoulders. Harry, understandably, didn't want to pick sides between his two friends, and Hermione certainly wasn't expecting him too. They just had to relearn how to be together as only friends, even though it was exceptionally clear that Ron still wanted Hermione as a girlfriend.

Hermione wasn't having it.

She just wanted her friendships back before the war took place.

The three of them moved onto the train and found an empty compartment, Hermione took a seat as far from Ron as was possible, something that didn't go unnoticed.

"Are you that repulsed by me?"

Hermione almost laughed.

"No, I'm not repulsed by you at all."

"If the compartment door was open you would be sitting in the corridor."

Hermione felt her cheeks heat up slightly. She wasn't trying to be childish, she just felt incredibly awkward around Ron now. Something she wanted to fix, she just wasn't ready to at the moment. Maybe once they were at school and spent a little more time apart she would remember how to be around him.

"Enough, Ron. Things are different now, it'll take some getting used to for everyone."

"You're honestly taking her side, Harry?"

"Her side? I didn't realize that there were sides to take."

"She dumped me!"

"Because it wasn't going to work out between you guys, at least she realized it quickly instead of dragging it out and making it worse in the end," Harry stated wisely as the train chugged out of the station.

"It could have worked! She didn't even give us any time to figure it out!"

"The chemistry just wasn't there, Ron."

"Chemistry? That is such a bullshit reason."

Hermione huffed, wanting to avoid an argument and not wanting to tell Ron that she felt she was destined to be with someone else. That would just cause even more issues between them since Ron wasn't the most level headed person. He was not understanding.

"See! You can't even defend it! You dumped me for no reason."

"I broke up with you because I couldn't stand the thought of kissing you one more time, slobbering all over me, I couldn't bear to think about our relationship going farther! We are not meant to be together in that way!"

Ron looked like he just got hit with something large in the face while Hermione's eyes flashed dangerously, fire in her irises.

"You… you bitch!"

"Ron!" Harry said sharply as Hermione jumped out of her seat, her temper flaring.

The compartment door slid open slowly, revealing the delighted face of Draco Malfoy.

"Finally you and I agree on something, Weaselby."

"Sod off, Malfoy."

"I was just coming by to get Granger, you're wanted in the Head's compartment." Malfoy met her eyes and she felt herself softening, her temper abating instantly and a strange sense of calm overcoming her, which was insane.

Pure insanity!

"Why? And why are you the one to come get her?"

"Well, Weaselby, they figured it would be best for the Head Boy to hunt down the Head Girl to come to the compartment and lend a hand in making the Prefects schedules for rounds, which will be much longer and arduous than usual, this year."

"You're Head Boy?"

"You're head Girl?"

Harry and Ron asked the questions simultaneously, Harry looking at Malfoy, Ron at Hermione.

Malfoy grinned maliciously and backed out of the carriage.

Hermione followed without a backward glance. She wasn't surprised that Malfoy was the Head Boy, it was outlined in her letter this year who had the position, as well as all of the details of her living arrangements. She didn't have it in her heart to tell Harry that she wouldn't be living in Gryffindor tower this year. She figured he would be really bummed to not have her around, and lately she didn't care about keeping Ron informed.

/

Hermione was shuffling from one foot to the other outside of the bathroom door in the Head common room. She had to pee.

Bad.

"Come on, Malfoy! You've been in there for ages!"

Draco was sitting on the edge of the tub, as he had been for at least five minutes, immensely enjoying the fact that Granger was about to piss herself right outside the bathroom door.

"Almost done!" he called gleefully.

He stood back up and looked in the mirror one last time. He looked tired but there wasn't much he could do about it. He made sure his sleeves were pulled down to his wrists before he finally vacated the bathroom.

Granger didn't say a word, just rushed by him into the bathroom and slammed the door behind her.

He noticed that she was spending more time in their shared common room than was really necessary. Couldn't she go to the Gryffindor common room and hang out with Scarhead and Weasel? They were inseparable in previous years, so why was she always hanging around by herself so far this year?

Annoying.

Not that he was about to ask her any questions about herself. Irritating bint.

They had already been at school for two weeks and Draco hadn't done one thing that was outrageously mean to Granger. He bickered with her, of course, and made her feel like shit most of the time, but he hadn't been straight up mean to the girl. For whatever reason, he felt himself become calmer when she was around, maybe he was becoming soft. He had a lot on his mind lately, a lot of sinister things were in the making and he found himself forced into the middle of it all. He was spending a lot more time in their shared room as well, only because whenever they were sitting in there, quietly reading, he felt better. He felt that he was able to turn off the horrible thoughts going through his mind constantly whenever he wasn't around her. He still got some sort of perverse pleasure out of tormenting her and making her feel bad about herself, but it seemed almost different now; regardless of all of that he was angry with everything, everyone, and he knew at some point he would take it out on the Head Girl.

It wasn't going to be pretty.

/

Granger came slamming into the common room late Saturday night, so angry she didn't even see Draco sitting in an armchair near the guttering fire. She had, once again, been playing referee between her friends, their relationships were deteriorating quicker than she had anticipated; at this rate Ginny and Harry would be broken up within the next few weeks. She wanted everything to go back to normal, to the way it was even as much as three months ago! Was that so much to ask for? They needed to be united and on the same page by the end of this school year if they had any hopes of winning this stupid war. Did they not understand that?! At least Harry's new lessons with Dumbledore were all about eradicating horcruxes, something they wouldn't have to worry about on top of everything else once the school year was over.

She threw her book bag at the wall angrily, cursing under her breath, which caused Draco to raise his eyebrows slightly.

He felt the familiar sense of calm that he usually felt when she was around, but he had had an especially stressful evening, and he pushed the contented feeling aside and let anger take over instead. He had received a letter from his father concerning his actions for the next couple of months and he was livid. He wasn't a puppet! He forced all of this anger to be directed toward Granger and jumped from his chair, his wand clutched tightly in his hand.

Granger jumped, seeing Draco there, and then visibly sighed in relief, dropping her hand that had been clutching her breast just seconds before - an action that she would regret over the next few weeks.

He almost laughed, this was the first time she had fully let her guard down around him and he was going to use it to his advantage.

"Aculateum!" he yelled, sending a stinging hex her way.

She hissed in pain seconds before diving behind the couch, he knew he hit her, he just wasn't sure where.

"Steleus!" she screamed, popping up from behind the couch before he could move around it to get her again. Her hex missed him by inches, but she was standing now, staring him in the eye.

"Tarantellegra!"

"Ducklifors!"

They continued shouting hexes and jinxes at each other, but they were both dodging them for the most part as they both started playing dirtier. Their common room was quickly getting destroyed, but neither of them seemed to care. Each of them were taking out their own frustrations and anger on the other. Draco moved so he was also behind the couch, nothing was between the two now.

They both shot the stinging hex at each other at the same time and caught each other this time. Each let out a breath and stumbled backward quickly, their magic getting stronger the longer they fought.

Draco's eyes were like chips of ice and Hermione's were dancing with fire.

Hermione didn't know why this started, but she quickly decided that she wasn't backing down first.

This thought distracted her, momentarily.

"Affligo!"

Hermione suddenly felt as though she had been punched hard in the face, her eyes watered and she stumbled back again.

Damn it, Malfoy!

"Arcus!" Hermione screamed in a fit of rage and arrows shot from her wand but again, they missed Malfoy, landing all around him.

He grinned at her now, an evil, frightening grin.

He knew they weren't messing around now that she had cast such a brutal curse, now it was getting dangerous for the both of them, and he couldn't have felt better about it. Finally he was with someone who could match him in wits, and apparently, anger.

"Castreo!" she yelled, and Draco doubled over, feeling as though he had been kicked in the genitals.

"Bitch!"

"Fuck you!"

He had never heard her swear like that before.

"Mortem Milia Secat!" Draco yelled recklessly, blades shooting from his wand.

Hermione's eyes widened momentarily when she heard him start the curse before she quickly said "Secans Copiosius!" which also caused blades to shoot toward Draco.

Both of their spells hit the target dead on and the knives disappeared as soon as Draco dropped to his side and Hermione fell forward, blood seeping everywhere.

They lay about a foot apart, both groaning in pain as their blood pooled around them. The puddles of their blood were about an inch apart and Hermione looked up into Draco's eyes, knowing that he was going to be the last person she would lay eyes on.

"Why did you attack me?" she asked him, tears running down her face.

"I just wanted to get some of the pressure off of my chest," he said weakly, "It wasn't supposed to go this far. I thought you'd dodge it, like you managed to do with most of the others."

She inched closer to him and once she was close enough to Draco she lifted her wand.

She could see the apprehension in his eyes.

"What are you doing?"

"I'm going to try to get us some help."

She closed her eyes for a moment and then something silvery shot from her wand. He tried to focus on it, and it looked like an otter shining brightly in front of his eyes.

It split into two, "Professors Dumbledore and Snape," was all she said before they went streaking out of the room.

Her tears were falling more rapidly now, they had both lost a lot of blood and it was mixing together on the floor.

"I'm so sorry!" she sobbed, leaning forward again to look into Draco's eyes, "I never meant to hurt you this bad!"

"I'm sorry I started it. I was just trying to get rid of some pent up anger and you were always the best target for me."

One of her tears landed on his face and he reached for her hand.

Call it a moment of weakness while dying, he didn't want to face whatever was coming on his own and apparently she didn't either since she dropped her head onto his bloody chest and tried her hardest to remember any healing spells she may have known.

She didn't know any, which seemed like a serious lack in judgement on the schools part considering there was a war upon them.

"I can't heal you, I don't know any healing spells."

Hermione still managed to sound indignant about this, how could she have never looked any up?

"I don't either."

"I want you to know, before we die, that I don't hate you, Draco. I think you're brilliant, and you're handsome, I think if you had gotten the opportunity you would have made someone very happy one day."

Draco wrapped his other hand in her hair at her scalp, his own tears leaving his body as he was feeling cold and exhausted, and everyone knew what that meant.

"I want you to know that I don't think you're disgusting. I think you are brilliant, beautiful, and I've always been jealous of you, at least a little bit. You're a gifted witch."

"You're gifted and brilliant too. I'm sorry it got this far, I was angry when I got back and I took it out on you."

"If I wasn't so miserable and confused with my life I wouldn't have attacked you in the first place."

"I don't hate you." She seemed keen on getting this point across.

"I don't hate you, either, I don't want to be any part of the movement that is supposed to eradicate you."

"Well you won't be, anymore," Hermione said, valiantly trying to stab at some humour in their bleak situation.

They lapsed into silence for a few moments, each trying to think clearly.

"Let's just sleep," Draco mumbled finally, pulling Hermione closer to his body with the little strength he had left.

Hermione agreed, closing her tired eyes, her head pressed into his chest with his hand, her body pulled flush against his.

"I'm sorry."

"Me too."

Hermione heard distant sounds, and then closed her eyes for the last time.

/

"What's going on Albus?"

Professor Dumbledore met Professor Snape outside the head corridor, each following the patronus of an otter.

"I'm not sure, I was summoned here just as you were."

Dumbledore, having the authority to enter any room in the castle, opened the door and gasped. The room was totally destroyed and there laying on the floor in each other's arms, blood surrounding them, were the Head Boy and Head Girl.

Snape gasped and ran forward, pulling his wand out. He started a counter curse, a low melodious song-like spell. He was whispering it beneath his breath, not taking his eyes off of the pair.

"Are you sure that's wise?" Dumbledore asked quietly.

Snape didn't answer but continued whispering his song like spell. The blood on the floor started flowing back towards the students, entering their bodies as their deep gashes healed slowly. When the last cut on each of their bodies was healed, a bright white light shone, causing both teachers to shield their eyes.

"You realize what you just did?"

"Yes," professor Snape answered, under his breath, "it was the only way to save them."

"We must get them to the hospital wing."

"Luckily it's after curfew."

Both teachers solemnly said a spell in a unison and both students floated up into the air. They were steered weightlessly to the hospital room and each placed in a bed, right beside each other. Professor Dumbledore moved Hermione's bed closer to Draco's and then pulled a curtain around the beds, shielding them from view.

Madam Pomfrey came rushing out, a questioning look on her face.

"Two students who seemed to have attacked each other, we fixed them up as best as we could in their common room, but they will still need tending to. They might be sleeping for a while…"

"Why will they be asleep for a while, Professor?"

"Blood bonded."

Madam Pomfrey's eyes widened.


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter Two**

Hermione's eyes opened slowly and she felt a hand in hers. She slowly turned her head to see Malfoy lying beside her, his bed pushed close. His eyes opened a moment later, staring at her.

"We're alive?"

"It looks that way."

"But… how?"

The matron of the hospital wing pushed through the curtains, carrying a tray with potions on it.

"Finally!" she exclaimed after turning around and seeing their opened eyes. She set the tray down and rushed away.

Both students just stared at each other, more than a little bit confused. Each found that they couldn't look away from each other. Almost as though they were seeing something new in one another, something the other liked. Hermione slowly removed her hand from Draco's tight grasp, still unable to look away from him.

"What happened?"

"I don't know, Granger, last thing I remember is dying."

Hermione nodded before finally tearing her eyes away from Draco's, looking toward the Matron who was coming back into their little secluded area.

"You've both had visitors, but they were sent away without even being able to see either of you. We informed them that you would be fine, but we couldn't allow them to see you."

"Why not?"

The question was asked simultaneously by both students.

"The way you two were clutching at each other in your sleep may have been slightly hard to explain to your friends. At one point we just moved Hermione into your bed, Draco, for fear that you would both fall out of your beds."

Hermione's cheeks reddened and Draco looked at the Matron of the hospital wing as though she had lost her mind, disgust contorting his features slightly.

"How long have we been here?"

"Three days. I've had to feed both of you sustaining potions to ensure that you were getting all of the nutrients you've needed."

Draco sat up on his bed, thoughts of the bathroom on his mind. He was dizzy for a moment as he moved, resting his head in his hands.

Hermione sat up as well and was in the same position, groaning softly as her head swam.

They both stepped from their beds and headed for their respective bathrooms. Madam Pomfrey didn't stop them, this would give the two professor's time to get here to deliver the news because she sure didn't want to be the one to inform them of the circumstances.

Hermione got back into her bed first, her eyes slightly out of focus.

"Pepper-up potion," Madam Pomfrey said, pushing a vial into her hands.

She swigged it down as Draco got into his bed and was given the same thing.

Their curtain shifted and Professors Dumbledore and Snape entered, each looking relatively unhappy.

Hermione gulped and looked at Draco.

Their eyes locked again, silver and gold staring at each other until one of the teachers cleared his throat.

"What happened?" They asked, simultaneously again.

Professor Dumbledore sighed and took a seat in an empty chair at the foot of Hermione's bed, Snape sat beside Draco's. Hermione was finally able to tear her eyes away from Draco's and was suddenly scared to hear what they were going to say, each looked grim.

"I think we should be asking each of you that."

Draco sighed, wanting to get away from Granger as quickly as possible, even if that included him admitting defeat.

"It was my fault."

Hermione looked at him, surprised, but he was looking at the teachers in front of them.

"I was angry and she entered the common room and I just… I lashed out at her. Neither of us meant for it to get as far as it did."

"I thought we died…"

"You almost did, Miss. Granger, you were both hovering precariously on the edge of death. Professor Snape thinks that you both did, indeed, pass; I'm not so sure, but at this point it doesn't matter, since you're definitely alive now. You both acted extremely foolhardy, I can't believe you did this. I trusted both of you to set an example for the younger students, to be the adults you are."

Hermione hung her head in shame.

"You will both be paying the price for your actions."

"Yes, Sir." Draco said, also looking rather sheepish.

"I don't think you understand, Mr. Malfoy," Snape snapped, "Your actions were foolhardy and we did everything we could in order to save you. You will both be paying the price for your actions for the rest of your lives!"

"What?"

Hermione felt panicky now, her stomach was in knots and her hands were shaking. _The rest of our lives?_

"While you two imbeciles were lying on the floor, dying in each other's arms, your blood was mixing."

Draco's eyes flashed, he was angry and fearful at the same time, which did nothing to relieve Hermione of her fears.

"Your blood was mixing and the only way for me to save you two for what you had done was to get the blood back in! I did what I had to do to save your lives but the consequences are life changing."

"No, no, no, no…"

Hermione looked at Draco in contempt.

"I'm sure you'll get over having some of my blood in your veins, Malfoy. I know it's not pure, but at least you're alive."

Draco said nothing, refusing to look at Hermione.

"What did you speak about as you were dying?"

Dumbledore asked this, and he leaned forward, expressing how important this question was.

"I…" Hermione was having a hard time remembering what was said between them.

Draco sighed, his cheeks taking on a slight pink tinge.

"I don't remember," Draco said quickly, embarrassment flushing his cheeks even darker, making it evident that he did, in fact, remember. No one pushed him on the subject, if he didn't want to admit to what he said then that was fine. The teachers did know, however, that it was something of great significance.

"And you, Miss. Granger? Do you remember what you told Mr. Malfoy?"

She sat silently for a moment, trying to remember everything that had taken place.

"Not really, Sir."

"Well I can be certain that whatever it was you spoke to each other was something significant, maybe feelings toward each other or the way your lives are turning out, whatever it may be, it was an indirect cause of the current _situation_."

Draco looked as though he was going to be physically ill, he understood something that Hermione hadn't grasped yet; maybe because he could remember what was said between them and Hermione couldn't.

Draco wasn't sure he understood everything though, he didn't understand why saying the things they said would somehow influence the rest of their lives.

"I'm sure you've figured it out, Draco? You may not, Hermione, since you aren't from a wizarding family, but because you were both dying in each other's arms, your blood mixing together on the floor, tears being shed over killing each other while professing, I'm sure, secrets to each other… and then the mixed blood was put back into your bodies…"

"Bloody hell!"

Draco really looked as though he was going to vomit this time and he was much paler than usual.

"What?!"

"Fuck, Granger…"

Draco was looking at her with fear in his eyes, fear and something else. It looked as though he was trying for hatred, but couldn't quite manage it.

"What?!" Hermione exclaimed, shrinking away from him.

"Merlin…"

"Someone tell me what is going on!"

No one had spoken since Snape's profession other than Draco, and he didn't seem able to get the words out.

"You and Mr. Malfoy have blood bonded."

"Blood bonded?"

She felt breathless, almost felt like she had been kicked hard in the stomach. Her cheeks reddened as she realized fully what they had done, the entirety of the situation was enough to make her head swim again. Hermione had heard about blood bonding from her many years of tearing through every book in the school library. She never looked into it and didn't know the full ramifications, was unaware how it happened even, but she knew one thing for sure: There was no turning back now.

She felt dizzy and sick.

She looked to Draco and he was, once again, holding his head in his hands.

Draco stood from his bed suddenly and rushed from the hospital room, throwing back one final look of loathing.

"It will take some time to come to terms with the fact that you two are now bonded for life. You will not be able to be with anyone else, nor will Mr. Malfoy, ever. There is a lot more to blood bonds, so if either of you have any questions, please don't hesitate to ask. Nothing like this has happened at Hogwarts for as long as I can remember."

"Once you two open up to each other some more, there will be some serious things to talk about," Snape said, standing from his chair, "I'm sorry about this, Miss. Granger."

"You will both be retaining your Head positions. I normally would never allow that to happen, but you will have to be in close proximity most of the time, and sharing a common room and having close sleeping quarters will be the best thing for you two. You'll both experience uncomfortable feelings if you're too far apart for too long."

Dumbledore stood to leave.

"Wait! Professor…"

"Yes, Miss. Granger?"

"Please don't tell anyone about this…"

"Of course not, that will be up to the two of you."

"I'm so sorry, professor."

Dumbledore didn't answer before turning and leaving the room.

/

Hermione left the hospital wing and even though she didn't want to she went straight to the Gryffindor common room. She was sure her friends were worried about her and she would try and answer their questions without revealing too much information.

She entered the room and everyone seemed to stop talking and look at her. Half the common room started shouting her name, asking her questions, but she ignored it all and walked to where her three friends were sitting.

"Hermione!"

She took a seat at the table they were at, their homework spread out in front of them.

"What happened!? We tried to visit you but Pomfrey wouldn't even let us in the room."

"Well… Malfoy and I got into a fight."

"A fight?"

Harry already looked furious.

"Yeah, we were dueling, basically."

"And you were hurt bad enough that you were in the hospital wing for three days?!"

"We were both in there for the same amount of time. We hurt each other equally."

"Why were you duelling?"

"I'm not even sure. I think it was just easier to attack him with all my anger about recent events than it would be to take it out on you guys."

"We do need to figure out a way to be with each other again without all of the animosity, I feel like we are really going to need each other in the future."

Harry said this while looking at Hermione closely and she nodded her agreement, glad that she wasn't the one who had to come out and say it.

"I'm sorry you guys."

"We're sorry too."

"So tell me how the fight started…"

Harry already looked as though he knew what she was going to say, knew it would be Malfoy's doing.

"I walked into the common room and didn't see him right away, he was sitting in an armchair and it was pretty dim in there. Once I realized it was him, I let my guard down, which I obviously shouldn't have done and he sent a stinging hex my way-"

"That stupid, bloody ferret!"

"Don't call him that, Ron!"

"What? Why not?!"

Hermione felt an overwhelming urge to defend Draco even at the slightest provocation, even though at this point she agreed with him. If that moron wouldn't have attacked her in the first place she wouldn't have just received the worst news of her life. Death may have been a better option.

"Just… don't. I am going to have to deal with him all year and I want to try to keep it civil from here on out. I think we learned some things about each other during our fight, maybe he isn't even as bad as we all think he is."

"Hermione… I think you should go back to the hospital wing because there is obviously something wrong with your head. He isn't that bad? We are pretty sure he's a _Death Eater_! His entire family is caught up in the Dark side. I will call him a lot worse than a ferret."

Hermione put her face in her hands, she could feel a headache coming on.

"I don't know! I don't need to go back to the hospital wing, thank you very much. I'm fine! I'm just saying that everyone is so quick to judge who is in the wrong and who is in the right!"

"And you determined this while you were dueling him? While he attacked you for no reason?" Harry asked quietly.

Hermione realized that she should have gone to her own common room before coming back here first. She needed to rest and come to terms with everything that had happened before she could even try and deal with her friends, and if she was going to have an overwhelming urge to defend Malfoy she would be better off doing it after she had her head on straight.

She felt a stabbing pain in her forehead and scrunched up her eyes.

"Are you okay, Hermione?"

"Headache. It's coming on fast.

She stood up on shaky legs, trying to will the headache away.

"I'm going back to my common room."

Hermione got up and slowly made her way out of the room, heading for her own space so she could think hard about her new situation. She couldn't even begin to fathom how she would spend the rest of her life with Draco sodding Malfoy, but she got herself into this situation, for the most part, so she would just have to deal with it. Not that there was anything to be done, it was irreversible. She knew that marriages happened young in the wizarding world, but this was a little bit extreme. Especially for someone who wasn't even planning on getting married until her mid-twenties, at least. But she was Hermione Granger for ef sakes, she was strong and resilient, so she would find a way to make this work.

"I'm going after her," Ginny said, "Something's going on."

/

Draco stormed away from the hospital wing, unbelieving. How could this have happened?! He was now blood bound to one third of the stupid bloody "golden trio", and he was a Death Eater, for Merlin's sake.

He didn't know anyone who was actually blood bound to another person, but he had heard stories about it, myths maybe, and he knew that no matter what, this was it. Granger, muggle-born, 'greatest witch of their time', pain in the arse, was his future. He couldn't even have sex with any other witch, ever again. He could certainly try but it wouldn't happen and it would cause more than a little pain.

He stormed to the Slytherin common room, wanting to avoid his own for the time being. Wanting nothing more in the world than to avoid Hermione Granger at this moment.

His life was totally fucked.

He entered the common room and went right for the couch in front of the fire. His friends, if he could call all of them that, were sitting there.

"Glad to see you're out of the hospital wing," Blaise Zabini said, in a tone that didn't exactly sound glad but more curious than anything.

"What happened, Draco?" Pansy asked, concern etched in her voice.

Marcus Flint and Theodore Nott said nothing, they just watched Draco with narrowed eyes.

"Granger and I had it out in our common room. Knocked each other out for a few days."

"That… mudblood bitch managed to knock you out for three days?! I'm almost impressed," Blaise said, looking at Draco in surprise.

"Don't."

He didn't want to defend her, not here in front of these people, but for some reason it slipped out. He managed to stop it at the one word though.

"Don't what?"

"We all know she's smart. She used spells I never would have expected from her, even some more on the controversial side. I was surprised and caught off guard."

They all nodded and looked shocked at his words. Perfect, know-it-all Granger was using questionable spells? Was she not as perfect as they all had her pegged to be?

 _Don't call him that, Ron!_

It resounded in his head loudly and he was taken aback. Could she hear his thoughts or words too?! Draco knew at that moment that Hermione was having a similar discussion with her friends. He suddenly had a pain in his head, like a large cleaver being smashed down and he dropped it into his hands, groaning slightly. Between his own thoughts of how he could end this and her thoughts, or whatever they were, clamouring for attention in his head, he thought it might explode.

"You okay, mate?" Blaise asked him, looking slightly shocked at the sudden change of demeanor.

"I'm going to my common room, I think I need to lay down."

"Do you need anyone to accompany you?" Pansy asked, still looking extremely concerned about his well-being.

"No," Draco said shortly before he realized she was just worried about him. "I'll make it on my own, thanks."

Pansy and Blaise were, after all, the only true friends he had ever had.

Draco left the dungeons and quickly made his way back to the Head dorms. He couldn't do this, not only would he be putting himself into danger but Hermione would most definitely be killed if anyone was to find out; probably his parents, Pansy, and Blaise as well. He couldn't be married to someone that he didn't love, or even care about! Someone that he had spent the better part of six years making miserable just for his own enjoyment. He knew that what he had told her when they were dying was true, but that didn't mean that he wanted to find himself stuck with the annoying bint for the rest of his life.

He got to the common room and was glad to see that Hermione wasn't there, he took long strides and threw open the door to his bedroom where he laid on his back on his bed and covered his eyes with his hands.

There had to be a way out of this. There just had to be. He couldn't risk everyone's lives because of his idiocy.

He was not going to be blood bound to the insufferable Hermione Granger.


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter Three**

Hermione made it two floors away from the Gryffindor common room before she suddenly felt a wrenching pain in her stomach, causing her to cry out and almost fall to her knees. She had no idea what was happening to her but she knew that she didn't like it. Her head was pounding, causing her eyes to water and now her stomach was twisting painfully.

She clenched her eyes shut for a moment, feeling nauseated, and was hoping she could at least make it back to her common room.

Her whole body was on fire now, her bones aching.

She fell to her knees and suddenly started coughing hard, blood dripping out of her mouth.

What on earth was happening?!

"Hermione?!"

The voice calling her name was hurting her ears, driving into her brain like a knife; she cringed away from it, hoping the person would take the hint and stop talking.

"Oh, Merlin."

She felt arms pulling her up but the person didn't seem to be strong enough so Hermione tried to get her feet under her to help the person, almost feeling like she was hallucinating the whole thing.

/

Ginny pulled Hermione to her feet and only hoped she could help by supporting her own weight, there was no way Ginny could carry her. She was glad when Hermione got her feet under herself, leaning heavily on Ginny for support, mind you, but still taking some of her own weight. She allowed Ginny to steer her toward the hospital wing, blindly following the pressure from the arm behind her back.

Ginny laboriously got her there, and by the time they were outside the doors blood was dripping not only from Hermione's mouth, but her nose and ears as well.

"Madam!" Ginny gasped as loudly as possible, but it seemed to be loud enough because Madam Pomfrey was suddenly in front of her, pulling Hermione out of her grasp.

"I don't know what's happening!"

"I do. You must leave, Miss. Weasley."

Ginny wanted to argue but could tell that the matron of the hospital wing would probably throw Ginny bodily from the room if she had to. Ginny decided that Hermione needed Madam Pomfrey's attention much more than she did and turned on her heel and marched out of the hospital wing and went directly back to Gryffindor tower, where she warded off questions from Ron and Harry and contemplated what she had just witnessed.

/

Professor Dumbledore sighed when Madam Pomfrey's patronus appeared in front of him for the second time that day. All the man wanted was a little peace to focus on Harry Potter's new lessons, for Merlin's sake. Was that too much to ask for?

Nevertheless, he jumped from his desk and went straight to his fireplace to floo himself to the hospital wing.

"What is it now, Poppy?"

He moved forward and immediately saw Hermione Granger, bleeding from almost every orifice and it was quite clear that she had just lost all the contents of her stomach.

Before he could say another word Severus floo'd in behind him.

"Find Mr. Malfoy!"

Snape took one look at Granger and turned around flooing directly to the Head common room. Luckily teachers could floo to every fire in the castle, if the situation warranted it.

Why they hadn't floo'd to the Head dorms when they received the patronus from Miss. Granger was beyond Snape, but there was no rectifying that now.

/

Snape stepped from the fireplace and did a quick sweep of the room, but realizing Draco wasn't in this part of the dorm he headed right up to the boys private quarters.

Draco was laying on his bed and he looked no better off than Hermione did. Blood was oozing out of his nose and ears, some staining his lips, and pooled on the bed around his head. Snape levitated him and rushed back to the fireplace, fitting himself inside beside the boy and flooing back to the hospital wing.

He stumbled out and moved Draco to a bed.

"Which one is trying to refuse the bond?"

"I'd say Draco," Snape said, meeting Dumbledore's eyes, "He has a lot going on, at the moment."

"Mr. Malfoy!" Dumbledore said sternly, moving toward the bed the boy was laid out on, "Stop it, this instant! You're killing both yourself, and Miss. Granger."

Draco opened his eyes as though it was the hardest thing he had ever done.

"We will die anyway," he ground out, blood beginning to pour from between his lips now instead of the continuous drip.

"That is not necessarily true, there will be a lot of changes but you can both live and I think you can both be happy together, just stop trying to deny the bond!"

Draco looked terrified but he slowly turned his head toward Hermione, who was still retching off the side of her bed, even though she definitely didn't have anything in her stomach anymore and most of the contents were bloody. There was blood running from her mouth, nose, ears, and even some dripping from the tear ducts of her eyes. Concern flooded his features.

"We aren't in love, I can't do this."

He sounded like a child even to himself. A child that knew he wanted to do the right thing but was trying to ask for an easy way out, trying to get someone to tell him to go ahead and that it would all be okay.

Dumbledore wasn't having it.

"Love grows, Mr. Malfoy. It isn't unusual for witches and wizards to get married young, half, if not more, of your class will be betrothed within the next few months anyway and half of those engagements will be arranged. No one, at the age of 17 is truly in love, but it can grow, and it does grow. Accept the bond, Draco. Accept it or you will both die tonight and never be able to experience the love that you both crave."

Snape stepped closer to Draco's bed.

"Love is a wonderful thing, Draco, and I think that you will get to experience it with Hermione if you both just give it a chance. I know it's scary, but death, or a life without love, is even more terrifying. Accept the bond."

Draco tore his eyes off of Hermione's pathetic form and looked at Snape.

"You think she could love me?" He could hear the pleading note in his own voice and it was there for a reason, he wasn't even able to be embarrassed about it. All Draco really wanted in this life was love and acceptance, and Snape was well aware of that, very aware of what the boy had been through in the last few years of his life.

"I do, in time."

Draco finally nodded and with his nod of acceptance another brilliant flash of light glowed, but this time red, lighting up the entire hospital wing.

Madam Pomfrey swept in immediately after the blinding red light dimmed and forced not only a blood replenishing potion into his mouth but also a dreamless sleep draught before rushing to an unconscious Hermione to administer the same potions.

"I hope she can love me, one day," Draco said in a drowsy way, the potion already beginning to take effect, "Love might save me."

/

"Draco tried to refuse the bond, Miss. Granger, that's what happened last night. He was concerned about what would happen to you if certain people were to find out what happened and he didn't want to put you in harm's way. He was unaware that refusing the bond would have such an effect on the both of you."

Hermione didn't say a word, just sat in her cot in the hospital wing and let it all sink in. Well at least now they both knew that trying to deny what was happening would only kill the both of them, and quickly.

"I'm sorry," Draco murmured from his cot beside hers.

She just shook her head, words failing her for a moment.

"What if it happens again?"

Her voice was small, and Draco felt awful for what happened the night before.

"I won't be putting either of us in danger that way ever again, Granger. I can assure you of that. Everything you felt, I felt too. I really am sorry."

Hermione nodded.

Draco got out of his cot and Hermione followed, leaving the hospital wing and heading for their common room. Thankfully, Professor Dumbledore personally excused them from their classes that day. Two near death experiences in three days seemed to get them off the hook for the day, even if no one else was aware of what had occurred. Draco and Hermione didn't speak on their way through the halls, each caught up in their own thoughts about what their lives were to be now.

Draco was now a blood traitor, worse than any Weasley even. He wouldn't go unpunished for this once people began to find out and he knew that it wouldn't be hidden forever. They would have to try and keep it secret for as long as possible though, he would like to keep the torture at bay for as long as he could.

Hermione wasn't thinking about things quite as sombre as Draco, she just knew her friends would be upset with everything, probably more upset than she was. They would at least understand that everything that happened was an accident and there was no way to avoid it now, unless she wished to die, which she didn't.

"I need a shower," Hermione mumbled when they entered their portrait.

Draco nodded, deciding that the best thing for either of them would be take this slow, work their way into even talking with one another, and Hermione headed to the bathroom.

She looked in the mirror and was glad to see that she really didn't look any different. She was fearful that she was suddenly going to have blond streaks in her hair or silver eyes or some other such nonsense. She sighed in relief, she was still Hermione Granger. Albeit she was now basically married to a pure blooded suspected Death Eater who hated her kind and had almost killed them both, again, the night before.

She sighed again and started the shower before removing her clothes.

Her shirt was off and she was in her bra, leaning down to pull her pants off of her legs when she saw it.

She was jolted and screamed. Loudly.

"What?!" Draco was outside the door in a flash, "What's wrong!?"

No answer.

He thrust the door open and Hermione was standing in front of him in her bra, her pants undone but still on. She looked shocked and was sputtering indignantly.

"What in Merlin's name is this?" she finally choked out.

She was pointing to the front of her right hip.

Draco moved closer and looked at the black image on her body.

"Runes," he breathed before standing up and pulling his shirt up. "Look! I have them too! They're different though."

"Are we marked because of our bond?"

"I would assume so," Draco said coldly, looking at Hermione as though she was daft.

"Oh, Merlin."

She was breathing heavily and he looked up at her, tears were welling in her eyes, but she seemed determined to ignore Draco's tone.

"I think we need to do some research. I've read about blood bonding but I was never really paying tons of attention to what I was reading because it didn't pertain to anything."

"Okay, after our showers we'll go to the library."

"Malfoy?"

"Hmmmm?"

He was looking at his rune again, running his fingers over it slowly.

"I'm really sorry about this. I didn't know it would happen… I didn't mean to ruin your life."

"Well there's no sense in regretting it, it won't do us any good. What's done is done. It wasn't your fault anyway, it was definitely a joint effort. I also didn't know that was going to happen last night when I was trying to refuse the bond. We just have to move forward from here, I think."

She looked surprised that he was being so adult about it when just moments ago he almost seemed like he was trying to goad her into an argument, then shooed him out of the bathroom so she could shower.

At first he had been livid and scared about the situation, but after speaking with Dumbledore and Snape the night before he realized that this might not necessarily be a bad thing. He wasn't excited about the prospect of spending his life with someone who actually drove him insane most of the time, but at least he knew he wouldn't ever be alone and Snape even said that he thought Hermione could love him one day, so that was a plus. The new circumstances didn't mean he was just going to completely turn around his attitude and everything in one night, but he was willing to try and be more civil to the girl.

He was, in fact, a Death Eater, which was obviously a huge problem, so he would have to do everything in his power to keep the wrong people from finding out what happened. He would tell Pansy and Blaise when the time was right, but other than that no one needed to know, at least until the war was over – Unless, of course, Voldemort won. If that was the case they were both dead, for obvious reasons.

This was a fucked up situation, but it could be with someone worse.

It could be Millicent Bulstrode, or Lavender Brown or something.

He shuddered.

/

"If you die, I die," Hermione whispered to him in the library, her face close to a book, "And we can communicate in our minds, but we have to practice, and sometimes we will even be able to hear each other's thoughts."

Draco looked up from the book he was perusing, a thoughtful look on his face and then he looked back down at his own.

"If we're too far apart we will get blindingly painful headaches, but if we consummate our bond then they won't be as bad, even tolerable, according to this."

He looked up and Hermione was looking at him with a shocked look on her face.

She composed herself and said, "This also says that we will share pain. I'm not looking forward to that, but again, as we get better at controlling ourselves the pain can be pushed away to the back of our minds where it will only be a slight discomfort, at the worst."

"Our magic is now even more advanced than it was before, which means that we will need to learn how to control it better. We will also get tired if we use too much magic in a short amount of time until we are used to sharing- since we technically share powers now and are able to lend to each other too - and in order to "recharge" we either have to sleep for long periods, snog, or, if we're really drained, have sex."

"Are you being serious right now?"

"Of course! I just read it to you!"

"Give me that!"

Hermione snatched the book from Draco, disbelief etched onto her face.

"Oh, Merlin."

Draco said nothing. He pulled the book back from her and continued to read.

"Our runes are each other's names…"

"You mean to tell me that I have "Draco" basically tattooed on my right hip!?"

"Yes."

"We've really done a number on ourselves here."

"I'm going to need to get some sort of makeup."

Hermione snorted.

"Just cover it magically."

"We can't. It says right here that they can't be altered or covered with any sort of magic. Not the exact words but that's basically what it says."

"Oh."

"Blood bonding is the most ancient and powerful of marriages."

"So… we're married?"

"Yes. And it can't be broken. We can't divorce, we can't be with anyone else. We could try and deny the relationship but… it says here that it mostly results in death, which we found out the hard way. That's why people have to be so careful with blood bonding ceremonies."

"So… we are husband and wife?"

Hermione was having a hard time grasping this notion.

"The runes on our hips are basically like permanent wedding rings, I guess."

"You're… my husband?"

"Merlin, Granger, how many times do I have to say it?" Draco snapped at her.

She glowered at him.

"Weddings to me are two people who are madly in love that had planned for ages, and then finally they meet with a justice and do their vows and place their rings on each other's fingers. Weddings are not dying together on a cold stone floor and waking up suddenly married. I can't believe this happened!"

"Hey, I didn't want this either!"

"This is all your fault!"

"My fault?! I didn't know it was happening any more than you did!"

"If you hadn't attacked me in the first place…" She spared one more glare for him and then stood up, slamming her book onto the table. She turned on her heel, leaving her book bag behind, and marched out of the library, her curls bouncing behind her and her nose slightly turned up into the air.

/

Hermione avoided Draco as much as she possibly could over the next month of school, not denying the bond, just… avoiding it.

He attempted to speak to her a few times, especially after their meetings with the prefects, when all the students were gone and they were tidying up before they could depart, but every single time it resulted in a huge argument between the two. Draco stopped trying to be even civil toward her and they stayed away from each other even if they were in the same room.

Both students were paying dearly for it.

Headaches were the most common thing. Bad headaches that almost made the eyes tear up, their brains feeling as though they had been beaten against their skulls. When their classes were on opposite sides of the castle, or one of them was in the grounds for Herbology lessons they could barely concentrate. They were both drained and so tired they could barely keep their eyes open at times. The only time they had some sort of relief was during shared classes, in their dorms at night or at meals because of their close proximity, and during prefect meetings. Neither of them had felt _good_ for a long time though, and Draco saw Hermione sleeping at the Gryffindor table at dinner a couple times, her friends looking concerned.

Hermione and Draco each tried to spend more time with their friends over the time they weren't spending with each other. Things were finally getting better between Ron, Harry and Hermione. Ron seemed to accept the fact that Hermione just didn't want to be in a relationship with him, but she had a feeling he was just biding his time; hoping that if he gave her space she would suddenly realize they were meant to be. Draco was doing the things he usually did – sitting around and making fun of people with his friends while trying to keep himself composed, his fears hidden. Pansy and Blaise both seemed to be able to sense that there was something wrong with him, something major going on, but like the Slytherins they were, they didn't press him for answers. They knew he would tell him when he wanted them to know.

Hermione and Draco were both very careful to keep their torsos covered at all costs, Draco found it easy enough, since he was already so used to keeping his forearm covered, but Hermione had a few close calls when reaching up to hug her tall friends. If anyone saw the runes marking their hips there would be questions that neither student were sure they could answer without giving themselves away. People weren't overly familiar with the ways of blood bonding anymore since the practice was very rare now, but there were plenty of purebloods around who had probably heard the stories, or myths, from the past.

If the headaches and constant drained and miserable feelings would go away, things would have been almost normal with the two students.

"Are you okay, Hermione?" Ginny asked her one day at the breakfast table, "Ever since you and Malfoy got into that fight you've been different."

"I'm fine, just have a headache."

This was a lie, her headache wasn't too bad at the moment because Draco was in the same room, but it seemed like her best excuse.

"You've had tons of headaches lately."

"I know, Ron. It's aggravating."

"Maybe you should see Madam Pomfrey?"

"No, it'll pass. I'll just meet you in potions, Harry."

Ron didn't make it into the advanced potions class since Snape demanded such high marks.

Hermione left the Great Hall and slowly made her way down to the chilly dungeons. She was suddenly grabbed from the back of her robes and pulled into an empty classroom.

"Don't scream!"

"Malfoy! What are you doing?! Get away from me!"

"I can't deal with these headaches anymore! I can't handle this!" He sounded panicked and Hermione's ears perked up, noticing the pain behind his words.

"Let me go!"

"No."

And with that he leaned forward quickly, capturing her lips with his. She struggled against him for a moment, but realized that she hadn't felt quite this well since before their fight; her energy was slowly returning to her.

She kissed back. Passionately.

Her hands crept up his back and tangled into his hair as he pulled her tighter to his body, their mouths battling for dominance.

There was a sudden bright flashing light that seemed to emanate from their mouths, Hermione pulled away, shocked.

"What was that?"

"That was our powers recharging, I think. I'm not sure. I feel so much better though."

"Me too," Hermione said grudgingly.

"Please stop avoiding me."

"You've been an outright arse, lately, which warrants me avoiding you."

"You haven't been a walk in the park, either, you know."

They stood in a stressed silence for a moment, and Hermione finally had to give in. Her renewed energy was proof that, like it or not, Draco Malfoy could make her feel better, more like herself.

"I'm sorry, I was just trying to deal with things in my own way."

"Well so was I, and pushing me away when I tried to approach you weeks ago hasn't helped. I've felt awful, I don't want to feel like this anymore."

"Well if you hadn't-"

"I don't want to fight with you right now."

"I just needed time."

"I think we both needed time. Maybe not for a month, but we both needed to just… come to terms with it."

"Yeah," Hermione breathed.

"Have you?"

"Have I what, Malfoy?"

"Come to terms with it?"

"I guess. I mean I know we'll never change it and I definitely agree with you about feeling really awful the last while."

"Can we move forward yet? Or is it going to result in more fights?"

Hermione sighed.

"I can't promise we won't fight, because that's what we do best, but I'm willing to try and move ahead."

"Good."

They stood in an awkward silence for a few more moments.

"Potions," Hermione said, reminding Draco they had to go.

"Let's go, then."

Draco opened the classroom door and peeked out, there was no one around so he ushered Hermione out of the room quickly. She scurried down the hall towards the potions classroom and once she rounded the corner he left as well.

"Interesting."

Draco spun around to see Theodore Nott standing there.

"What's interesting?"

"I saw you watching the mudblood head to class. Spying, Draco?"

"Of course not!"

"Do you have a new crush, Draco?"

Draco gave Theodore the biggest sneer he could muster and they began walking down the hall.

"I will admit that she's hot."

"What?" Draco almost tripped over his feet when he heard those words come from Theo's mouth.

"The mudblood, she's hot. I know she's disgusting and goes against everything we stand for but she's still… I don't know there's definitely something about her that makes my cock twitch."

Draco closed his eyes momentarily, trying to swallow the words that were bubbling up within him. He had been doing this a lot lately to keep his friends from being curious as to why he was always defending her.

"Please, Theo."

"I wonder if I could get her alone in a classroom somewhere, I mean it doesn't exactly have to be consensual."

Thankfully they had come up on the classroom, Draco pushed through the door instead of commenting on anything Theodore had said.

 _Can you hear me?_

 _Hermione?_

Nothing. He would have to work on this.

Headache at bay, Draco found that he was finally able to concentrate on his classwork.

Hermione was also able to concentrate on her schooling and she was glad they had come to some sort of terms with each other. She didn't want to revert back to the feelings she had been enduring for the last month. She was fully aware that it was her fault she was feeling so badly, but she wasn't able bring herself to even look at Malfoy, never mind talk to him. Hopefully now things would be better and they would both be able to get back to their lives without the debilitating pain of being apart.

She vowed to try and be civil, even though she really didn't care about him; really didn't _like_ him.

Even if he was her husband.


	4. Chapter 4

**A/N- I know I'm posting fairly rapidly right now, but I'm doing it so I can catch this site up to where I've posted on other sites - unfortunately I won't be able to keep it up! Anyway, I a;so want to say a great big thank you to everyone who has followed/favourited/reviewed this story so far! I really hope everyone is enjoying it, since I haven't heard anything in a review... and if you do want to leave a review andet me know what you think, don't be shy!**

 **Chapter Four**

 _Stop talking! Stop, or I swear you will regret it._

Hermione jerked upright, she had been sitting in the Gryffindor common room with Ginny, Ron and Harry when Draco's voice suddenly burned through her mind.

She leaned forward, ignoring whatever Ron was saying and put her head in her hands, concentrating as hard as she possibly could. They had been practicing over the last couple of weeks but for some reason Draco was way better at contacting her then she was him.

 _Draco?_

 _Draco, can you hear me?_

 _Hermione?!_

 _Are you okay?_

 _I'm fine, sometimes I just can't control myself when I find I have to defend you. I don't want anyone to become suspicious but I can't seem to help it at times._

 _Where are you?_

 _Going back to our common room._

 _Okay I'll meet you there in a while._

 _Hermione?_

 _Yeah?_

 _Watch out for Theodore, okay?_

 _Theodore? Theodore who?_

 _Theodore Nott! Goofy looking Slytherin? In our year. Watch out for him. He said something to me a couple weeks ago about you and he keeps bringing it up. I keep meaning to tell you but whenever we are together we are… otherwise indisposed and then I forget to tell you._

Hermione felt her cheeks redden at his words.

 _Promise me!_

 _Okay, yes, I'll watch out for him._

 _See you soon!_

"Hermione?"

"What?"

"I asked if you're looking forward to Hogsmeade this weekend, it will be so nice to get out of this damn castle, even for a few hours."

"I don't know if I'm going."

"Come on Hermione! It'll be fun. It's not because you're still trying to avoid me, right?"

Hermione laughed.

"No, Ron. I'm not, I swear."

"Then come to Hogsmeade with us!"

"We'll see," Hermione said, glancing toward Harry and Ginny who were sitting close together on the couch, Harry's arm around Ginny's shoulders.

"I'm glad you guys aren't fighting anymore."

"I'm glad you and Ron got over your issues."

Hermione turned slightly red and glanced at Ron, who was glaring at Harry for saying that. As far as Hermione could tell, Ron still had a thing for her. She chose to ignore it in order to keep the peace; she couldn't imagine telling him that she was already married – and had been for almost the last two months, to Draco Malfoy, no less.

"Yeah," Hermione said absently, her cheeks burning again, this time at the thought of being someone's wife.

"Are you feeling okay? I thought your headaches have been gone for a few weeks. You look a little flustered." Ginny was leaning closer to Hermione as she spoke, trying to convey her concern.

"I'm fine. I should probably be getting to my homework though."

"It seems like you're really distracted lately… what's going on with you?"

"I'm in my NEWT year, Ginny. I have so much homework and planning about the future to worry about."

"Okay, well if you ever need to talk, I'm here."

Hermione looked directly at Ginny, realizing that she hadn't had any girl time with her since school began and also came to the conclusion that Ginny probably knew there was something major going on and was probably feeling extremely left out. She had only asked Hermione about her episode when Draco had tried to refuse the bond one time and Hermione explained it away as a residual effect to the fight between them a couple days before. Ginny never asked again.

Hermione felt guilty.

"I know you are, Gin. I have to go, I'll see you at breakfast!"

/*

Another week went by and it was suddenly November. Hermione and Draco were getting on much better than they were in the beginning but they still bickered like the teenagers they were. They seemed to be unable to not fight with each other, and Hermione sometimes caught herself wondering if they did it because that was all they knew how to do. She resolved to fight with him less and try and be nicer to him. They were also slowly getting used to each other's patterns. Hermione knew that Draco preferred to shower in the morning and that he would rather drink coffee than tea. Draco knew that Hermione also liked to shower in the morning in order to attempt to keep her hair tame, but sometimes showered in the evening just to please him, or keep the peace. He also knew that she read for pleasure much more often than she read for school, and he found this endearing. They still had very important things to talk about but both seemed happy enough skirting the issues for now, whenever they were brought up, things would become much more serious between them.

"Draco?"

"Hmm?"

Draco was laying on the couch staring at the ceiling so she knew that he was deep in thought, making her reluctant to speak to him. This was something they needed to talk about, though.

"When are we going to be able to say something to our friends about what's going on?"

"Like who?"

"I want to tell Ginny. I feel like I'm betraying her by keeping this a secret."

"So tell her."

"Really?" Hermione was a little more than surprised that he wasn't turning this into something more.

"Sure, if you trust her enough, tell her. I want to let Pansy and Blaise in on our little secret but I'm really unsure if it would be the best move."

"Why?"

Draco sat up and watched Hermione closely for a moment. Now that he actually thought about it, he wasn't sure if she knew that he was a Death Eater. They hadn't got to any point in their relationship where clothes were removed but he was sure she had her suspicions.

He sighed and stood up from the couch, facing her.

Their eyes locked.

"I think you may have had your suspicions about this, I don't know if it's been confirmed or not…"

He slowly pulled up his left sleeve, revealing the red tattoo of the skull on his arm.

She pulled her eyes away from his finally and looked down, her eyes widened momentarily, but she didn't seem overly shocked.

"I thought so," she said sadly, "When did you get it?"

"This summer."

"Was it awful?"

Draco was confused, why wasn't she freaking out and running away from the big, bad Death Eater?

Because even if she did, it didn't change the fact that she was married to one. _Bonded_ to one, and they both knew what would happen if they tried to refuse each other, or even avoid spending time together. She was scared now that this had been confirmed and she wasn't stupid enough to let the ramifications of it pass her knowledge.

Her husband was, indeed, a Death Eater.

She took his moment of silence as a yes and then asked, "What are you going to do now?"

"I don't know. I mean I obviously can't exactly support this cause of the Dark Lord's," a small smile played around his mouth, "since my _wife_ is a muggle-born and all."

"Wife. That still sounds so weird, no matter how many times I hear you say it… Maybe we should talk to Dumbledore…"

Draco was obsessed with referring to Hermione as his wife. He liked the way it sounded, the way it made him feel. He also knew she wasn't used to it yet, so he said it as much as possible, as though he needed to drive the point home.

"I've been thinking about it, but I have my reservations - I don't want my family to be punished because of me."

Hermione sighed.

"We got ourselves in deep, Mr. Malfoy."

"That we did. We'll figure it out, just let me think about it all a little bit longer. I have a question for you, now."

Hermione just looked at him.

"Why would you have invited Professor Snape to our rooms that evening? You asked for both Snape and Dumbledore, why did you do that?"

"He's good with counter curses. I thought it would be a good thing for him to come as well. I won't deny that he is an amazing wizard, and if any two professors at this school would have been able to help us it would have been Snape and Dumbledore."

Hermione wasn't sure if she wanted to tell Draco yet that Snape was a spy for the light.

"You're lying to me. You're an awful liar, but I'll drop it for now."

Hermione only stared at him, neither confirming nor denying his words. Why was he being so easy tonight?

"So, I can tell Ginny about us then? I won't tell her about," Hermione gestured to his arm, "but I honestly do feel like I am betraying her, she knows something's going on and I haven't said a word."

"Tell her."

Hermione smiled and stood up as well, moving into Draco's embrace.

"Thank you."

They hugged and their lips found each other for a slow kiss.

"I'm going to go find her, then."

"See ya," he said, throwing himself back onto the couch to resume staring at the ceiling and thinking about what he was going to do. The question sat heavily on his shoulders, he had more than his own future to worry about.

/*

It was a little bit later than Hermione realized when she left for the Gryffindor common room, probably around curfew, she figured, since she hadn't seen anyone in the halls. Now that she was Head Girl she didn't have to worry about being in her common room by a certain time, she technically didn't have a curfew.

She was grabbed from behind and laughed lightly, assuming it was Draco since he did this at least four times a week.

"Dr…. Nott?" She had paid more attention to the Slytherin's in her year so she could pick him out of the crowd.

Her breath caught in her throat, Draco's warning flashing through her mind.

"What do you want, Nott?"

"Well, well, well, if it isn't the mudblood that Draco can't seem to stop defending. What is it you're doing for him in that shared common room of yours?"

"What?"

Hermione pulled out her wand out but she had barely cleared her pocket before it was pulled from her fingers.

"I'll just take that…"

"Give me my wand back, Nott," Hermione said, while desperately trying to contact Draco with her mind.

Theodore put her wand into his pocket and then grabbed her by her arms, pushing her back into the wall. Hermione was small, she was 5'4"and weighed about 120 pounds soaking wet. The boys in this school, for the most part, were large. Seventh years were averaging at 6 feet and weighed at least 200 pounds, mostly muscle. The upcoming war was being taken very seriously.

He held her there tightly, leaning down and brushing his lips against hers, causing a small electric shock to assault her lips. She pulled her face to the side, her eyes wide. What the hell did he think he was doing?

"Let me go!"

Theodore took both of her wrists into one hand in a crushing grip, holding them above her head and his other hand started to roam beneath her shirt.

 _Hermione?_

 _Oh, Merlin! Draco!_

 _What's going on?_

 _I need help!_

 _With what?_

 _Nott…_

Draco jumped from the couch the second Theo's name reverberated through his mind, anger immediately coursing through his veins.

 _Where are you?_

 _In an empty classroom heading to the Gryffindor-_

Draco felt a pain on his right cheek and knew that Theo had hit her.

Hermione's cheek throbbed.

"Let me go, Nott! What would you want with a filthy mudblood like me, anyway?"

"I think you know what I want."

He unbuttoned her jeans - she typically wore muggle clothes when she wasn't wearing her school uniform for classes - and he started to pull them down her hips.

His head cocked to the side when he saw the black runes against the golden skin on her hip and she cursed inwardly.

"What is that?"

"Muggle tattoo!"

"What does it mean?"

"Clarity."

Nott laughed cruelly and continued to lower her jeans.

"Stop, please don't do this. You don't want anything to do with me, if you let me go now I won't even tell anyone this happened."

"Tell whoever you want, mudblood, I don't care."

"You'll be expelled!"

"I don't care! School is so unimportant in the grand scheme of things."

Hermione looked at Nott's arm, the one holding her hands above her head in the crushing grip, and realized it was his left hand and she could see the bottom of a red mark…

The Dark Mark.

She had been looking at Draco's identical one less than thirty minutes ago.

"I don't think your master would be very pleased to know that you were having lustful thoughts over a mudblood…"

Theo froze for a second and then dropped her hands, his free left hand coming around and slapping her hard across the face before she could even consider defending herself.

He grabbed her by the throat this time and threw her against the wall again, pushing into her esophagus tightly. Her hands fluttered up and tried to pry his loose, but she couldn't, so she ended up just holding onto his wrists tightly.

 _Draco! Hurry, please._

 _I'm looking for you, I have to check every classroom._

 _The torches are lit! Look for one with light coming from beneath the door!_

 _I'm looking!_

 _He's strangling me!_

"You better be careful what you say, mudblood! I can kill you right now and it wouldn't even faze me, it wouldn't cause me to lose sleep at night."

He let go of her throat and she doubled over gasping for breath.

"You're lucky I want a piece of you before your death, if I didn't want it so bad I would honestly just kill you now."

He shoved her to the ground quickly and her head slammed off the stone floor a little harder than he intended it to, not that he cared. His body was over top of hers, but she was dazed and wasn't defending herself.

He leaned forward and placed a chaste kiss on her lips before he ripped her shirt down the middle.

Nott caught one of her breasts in his hand and she started to struggle against him, her hands weakly pushing at him, slapping at his face, but it didn't deter him one bit. He pulled her breast out of the cup of her bra and leaned his head down, assaulting her exposed flesh with his mouth.

Now she really began to panic, pain began lancing through her breast as though she was being electrocuted repeatedly. She realized that this was against her blood bond and she started to take a breath so she could scream out, but before she did Nott was ripped brutally from her body.

She looked up and Draco was looming over her, looking murderous. He spun Theo around and had the front of his shirt gripped in both hands, their faces only about a foot apart.

"Draco, mate, what are you doing?"

Draco's eyes started to glow.

Actually glow.

Hermione sat up quickly and grabbed her wand out of Nott's pocket, she muttered a quick "reparo" and touched the wand to her shirt, which mended itself before she righted her jeans.

"Draco? What's going on?!"

Theodore Nott was scared, not that Hermione could blame him.

Draco's eyes were glowing and the silver seemed to be radiating out, looking like pale chips of ice, his blond hair was whipping around his head in a non-existent wind, and his muscles were taut, straining against his shirt. As he pulled Nott closer to his face the room dropped in temperature, enough that they could see their breath puffing out in front of their mouths.

"Draco," Hermione said, moving closer.

Nott looked at her in surprise.

"Draco, stop. Its fine, I'm fine."

"It is NOT fine!"

Hermione reached out and placed her hand on his arm but realized immediately that it was a mistake, he started to draw her power too and now the cracking of magic could be heard, it seemed to be shooting blue sparks off of his body. She withdrew her hand quickly.

"Let me go, Draco, you're losing your mind. What do you care if I fuck the mudblood, anyway?"

"DON'T CALL HER THAT!"

"I'll call her what I want to! I'll touch her if I want to! You shouldn't care if I want to fuck the bitch!"

Hermione thought that Nott was being extremely daft, she would never provoke someone who was in this state. It was obvious that Draco was doing his best to reign in his power and control himself, but it wasn't doing much good.

"I care if you touch her, and I care if you try to fuck her, Nott, because she's my _wife_!"

"Draco…" Hermione whispered this.

"What?!" Theo yelled, shock on his face, "Your wife?!"

"That's right Nott, so back the fuck off."

"Draco! Stop!"

Draco looked at Hermione and their eyes met, locking up.

"Calm down! Please calm down!"

Her eyes were scared, but she was also trying to get him to realize what he had just done. Theodore looked between the two and saw the way they were staring at each other.

It was unnerving.

Slowly, Draco began to reign himself in. His hair stopped whipping around and he wasn't crackling with magic anymore, the room warmed back up and his eyes softened slightly. He took a deep breath and finally broke his eyes away from Hermione's, looking down at Theo again.

"I guess I'm going to have to kill you now," Draco said, looking Theodore in the eye.

Hermione watched on in shock.

"No! No, you don't have to do that."

Theodore obviously found Draco terrifying, probably more so after he witnessed the amount of power that Draco possessed.

"I do. I know you'll let the Dark Lord know as soon as you possibly can. I can't allow that."

"I'll take an unbreakable vow! Just please, don't kill me."

"An unbreakable vow… hmm… Hermione would you mind doing the honours?"

She made sure to word things carefully so that there were no loopholes that Nott could get around. He promised to not speak a word to anyone about what he learned, he was unable to show anyone any sort of memories or even allude to the fact that he knew Draco was married to a muggle-born, or that Draco was married at all. He wasn't allowed to draw attention to the tattoo on Hermione's hip in any way, shape or form. He also wasn't allowed to allude, talk about, or show anyone the power he had seen radiating from Draco, as it was alarming and they had to figure out what it meant. They definitely didn't want Voldemort to be informed of his power, what a weapon he would be.

As soon as the ritual for the unbreakable vow was preformed, Nott fled the room.

Draco seemed to be weakened suddenly, leaning against a desk for support.

"Are you okay?" he asked Hermione, worry marring his handsome features.

"I think so. Did you feel the pain when he kissed me, and in my chest, or was it just me?"

"Oh no, I felt it."

"I'm sorry, I tried to fight him off."

Hermione's vision swam suddenly, now that the adrenaline was wearing away. She reached back to touch her head and her fingers came back with blood on them.

She looked at Draco, surprised.

"Hospital wing, now."


	5. Chapter 5

**Chapter 5**

He grabbed her by her arm, near the crook of her elbow and began steering her out of the room forcefully, heading for the hospital wing.

Their trek was slow, Hermione's head was fuzzy and unfocused, Draco was extremely tired, but they were finally nearing the hospital wing. They were on a flight of stairs and both had to take a break so they didn't fall down the bloody things and break their necks. They sat down and pressed their foreheads together, trying to gain enough energy to walk.

"Kiss me, quick, I need to recharge."

Hermione leaned in without second thought and pressed her lips to his, he immediately pressed his tongue into her mouth and they both felt the hum of power flow through them.

Draco reluctantly pulled away and lifted Hermione back to her feet. He moved her down the stairs slightly ahead of him so he could see her head and his eyes widened when he saw the blood flowing down the back of her neck. He felt slightly renewed from the quick kiss they shared but knew this time that he would need more than that in order to gain his powers and energy back for a substantial amount of time, either sex or sleep for a week.

Ginny watched from the shadows as the couple moved toward the hospital wing. She had been heading to the Head common room to speak to Hermione when Theodore Nott went scurrying from an empty classroom, she stopped so she wasn't seen and then saw Draco pulling Hermione out by her arm. She followed behind them, seeing the blood on Hermione and how completely drained Malfoy was. She felt a surge of anger when they shared a kiss on the stairs but she could also slightly feel the power radiating from them when their mouths met.

Draco slammed the door to the hospital wing open and called for Madam Pomfrey, who came hurrying out of her office almost at once.

"Help her, I need to go get professor Snape and Dumbledore, we have some questions."

"Sit down, Mr. Malfoy. You don't look to be in any state to make the long journey to get both of them. I'll just send a patronus."

Draco moved with Hermione to a hospital bed, slowly, and they both sat upon one bed, leaning into each other.

Madam Pomfrey sent out her patronus charms, the same way Hermione had the night they killed each other, and moved quickly toward them.

"What has happened, Mr. Malfoy?"

"Hermione hit her head, really hard I think, it's bleeding."

She was mumbling incoherently beside him, reaching for his hand with hers.

"I can't talk to her in my mind at all, something must have happened! I can usually contact her in my mind with no problem whatsoever, something's wrong!"

"Calm down, Mr. Malfoy, let me look at her."

Draco reluctantly moved away from Hermione and waited for a few minutes. Finally, after what seemed like hours but Draco knew was really only minutes, the fire in the hospital wing lit up bright green ejecting Albus Dumbledore and Severus Snape.

Ginny moved closer to the doors of the hospital wing so she could hear what was going on more clearly.

"What has happened?" Snape snapped, looking at Hermione on the bed, who looked totally out of it and Draco leaning forward with his head in his hands, taking deep breaths. Draco looked up and moved off of the bed, standing at the bottom of it so that the teachers could have better access to Hermione, but no one moved forward.

"Hermione was attacked by Theodore Nott on her way to the Gryffindor common room. She was going to tell Ginny Weasley what happened between us, because she has been feeling guilty about keeping her in the dark. Anyway, Nott cornered her in a classroom and hit her a few times, he also had her wrists held tightly in his hands," Draco lifted one of her arms, showing them the bruising on her wrists and then lifted his own to the lights to see that he had faint bruises around the wrists as well, "and she was panicking when he was strangling her, so I know he was doing that too. I'm not sure exactly how the head injury happened but it wasn't long before I found them, I felt it too, but it obviously didn't do as much damage to me as it did to her; I'm not bleeding but I do feel woozy."

Everyone was standing there in silence, staring at him.

"So I take it you two have figured out how to speak in your minds?"

"I can contact her without a problem but she still seems to have trouble getting in touch with me, she's done it, but not as often as I have."

Draco was slumped over, one shoulder hanging lower than the other since he was so tired.

"What has drained your energy like this, Draco?"

"When I found them… Hermione and Nott, he had her shirt ripped in two and he was… well you know, fondling her. I couldn't control the anger I felt, seeing her like that. It was strange, I couldn't get any control over myself, I knew something scary was happening; I had a rushing in my ears and when Hermione put her hand on my arm I could feel the magic crackling through me. I've never felt so tired. Don't worry about Nott at the moment, we made him take an unbreakable vow about everything he learned and witnessed."

"Draco! That's illegal!"

"Well I would rather do that than have Nott tell the wrong people, Sir," Draco said, giving Snape a look totally full of meaning, "Or do you disagree?"

"I'm going to have to ask Hermione about what happened with you when she's more coherent." Dumbledore said, ignoring Draco's last comment, "I will deal with Mr. Nott accordingly tomorrow."

"We have some questions for you, as well."

"Like what?"

Draco lifted the right side of his shirt, "This, for starters. Why didn't anyone explain any of this to us?"

"We told you to come to us if you had any questions," Dumbledore said quietly, "So let's hear them."

Draco felt nauseated suddenly and leaned forward quickly, groaning. He looked at Hermione and realized that no one was helping her seconds before she leaned over and retched on the floor.

"Can someone please do something for Hermione first?! She's sick and needs help!"

"It's nice to see that you've accepted the caring husband role so quickly."

"It's not like I had a choice," Draco snapped, "Help her."

"You had a choice, Draco. You could have accepted the husband role without caring about her. It's your choice to care."

"JUST HELP MY BLOODY WIFE!"

Draco was quickly losing control of himself again and definitely didn't feel like sitting here listening to Dumbledore's annoying comments while Hermione was so sick.

Snape looked toward the hospital doors quickly and marched away purposely.

Draco watched him go, confused.

Madam Pomfrey jumped into action and immediately began to heal Hermione's wounds after cleaning the floor and casting a charm to clean Hermione's clothes and also her mouth, starting with the back of her head and rubbing a paste onto her bruised wrists. She was just in the process of checking Hermione's throat when Snape strode back to them, dragging a frightened looking Ginny Weasley along behind him.

"I found this lurking outside the doors, listening to everything."

Dumbledore looked at Ginny as though x-raying her.

"Eavesdropping never does anyone any good, Miss. Weasley."

Ginny didn't look ashamed at all, curiosity was the only identifiable emotion on her face.

"She seems fine, Headmaster. I'm just going to get a potion to eradicate any concussion she may have, and after that she'll be right as rain."

Madam Pomfrey strode away toward her medicine cabinet and no one spoke until she was back and urging Hermione to take the potion.

Hermione groaned and her eyes fluttered for a moment. Her eyes suddenly snapped open and landed on Draco.

They stared.

"Why does this happen, professor?! Sometimes when our eyes meet they just lock up and we stare, it's weird and I'm always worried someone is going to catch us. I have the hardest time looking away."

He moved closer to her bed and she reached for him automatically, pulling him to sit down beside her, their hands clasping tightly. Once he was close enough they tore their eyes away from one another and both looked at Professor Dumbledore.

"Why did Draco's powers go insane earlier? And even more so when I touched him?"

"What happened with his powers, Miss. Granger?"

"His eyes were glowing and the silver in them was almost scary, they looked like chips of ice, his hair was whipping around his head, almost like it was windy, except we were inside where there was definitely no wind. His muscles were all straining so hard I thought his shirt was going to rip and it got extremely cold in the room within seconds. Then I touched him and I could feel him drawing power from me too, he started crackling with electricity, it almost started to shoot sparks off of his body!"

"What, exactly, do these damn runes say?"

"Let's try to answer one question at a time, I have already told both of you that you're the first students I have encountered who have-"

"Has everyone forgotten that Miss. Weasley is standing right here?!" Snape snapped, cutting Dumbledore's words off.

"Ginny?"

Ginny stepped out from behind Dumbledore, a confused look on her face.

"What's going on?" she asked meekly, she had already heard Malfoy refer to Hermione as his wife. He must be going mad.

But yet, Hermione's sitting on a bed with him, holding his hand tightly…

Hermione felt her energy drop considerably and was surprised that Draco was even still able to sit up.

Draco glanced at her and then turned to Ginny.

"Sorry, Weaselette, but you're going to have to see something you probably never wanted to see, and I want the professors to try and determine what this bloody white light is," Draco said before he looked over at Hermione.

"Kiss me."

"Kiss him?!" Ginny was beyond confused.

Hermione leaned in without question, craving the energy that was generated from their kisses, and when their lips touched both of them shut their eyes at the same time. Draco, again, pressed his tongue into her mouth and she hungrily accepted it, rubbing her tongue along his in a slow, passionate kiss. When they were almost out of breath and about to pull away the white light flashed brilliantly throughout the room.

Dumbledore gasped in surprise.

They broke apart and each felt slightly rejuvenated, Snape was looking at them knowingly.

"What in the name of Merlin is going on?" Ginny asked, dropping into a chair beside the bed Draco and Hermione were occupying.

"I'll explain everything to you Ginny, I promise, I was actually going to do that tonight before I got… sidetracked."

 _Sidetracked, right._

 _Shush._

 _I want to know what the light is._

 _Me too. I want to know a lot of things, but I'm more concerned about what happened to you in that classroom._

Draco nodded and then remembered Hermione wasn't looking at him, since they weren't talking aloud.

Snape sighed.

"If you could not talk in your minds while we're trying to speak to you out loud, that would be great."*

"Sorry, Professor."

"Talk in their minds?"

"Bear with us, Miss. Weasley, it'll all make sense after, but we have some things to discuss. If Hermione and Draco say it's okay for you to remain in the room during the discussion then that's fine, if not, you'll have to go."

"Hermione was going to tell her everything tonight Professor Dumbledore, I think it's fine if she stays."

Hermione seemed to be thinking about it.

 _What if they ask us embarrassing questions?_

 _We haven't done anything that could be remotely embarrassing, yet._

 _You really don't mind if she stays?_

 _Not if you want her to stay._

 _Thank you._

Snape sighed again.

"Stop it."

"Ginny can stay."

"This is so strange, Hermione. I can tell that you're talking to him in your mind, now that I know that's what you're doing."

"Oh it gets weirder, trust me."

"Even more so than I think you realize, Miss Granger. As for Draco's power, and this is just a guess right now, but it seems as though he is releasing powers that make me think he may, or may not, be an elemental. This is too premature to tell yet, but the fact that he was crackling energy and his hair was whipping around his head with no wind while the room dropped in temperature… that's telling. We will have to wait and see. It seems that as of now, it only occurs when extremely angry."

"So if Draco has these powers…"

"You will too, Miss. Granger, we just have to wait and see when they decide to show themselves."

"What's the bright white light?! Why does it happen whenever our kisses get passionate?"

"I can't be certain about that yet, either. I do feel as though that has something to do with your new found power. Maybe your powers are reacting to one another."

"It's definitely an elemental power, Albus," Snape cut in, "It happens once they've found their elemental match, so Miss. Granger definitely has some powers in there too."

Hermione was contemplating this information, she knew she was a smart girl and a powerful witch, but she never would have considered having elemental powers.

"We read up on our," Draco glanced at Ginny quickly, not exactly wanting to reveal things in this sentence, "situation, and it says that these are our names?"

Draco stood up slowly and lifted his shirt to reveal his runes, Hermione followed suit. Ginny looked on with wide eyes, surprised to see the black markings on their bodies.

"Well, Draco, yours says "Hermione", but below that, see that other little rune? It's quite small, but it says 'Fire'"

"Fire?"

"Hermione is opposite, it says 'Draco' and then below that, 'Ice'"

"Fire and Ice?"

Draco laughed. It seemed only too fitting for them.

"Maybe your elemental powers? They're quite rare you know, elementals. You're the first two I've encountered in years. You are, as of now, the only two at our school for the time being, but that could change as the powers don't start showing themselves until mid-teenage years. No one under fifth year would ever show the powers of an elemental."

"So why haven't our powers shown themselves before, then?"

"Your powers don't show until you've found your elemental 'match', which is really actually your opposite, the person who can keep your powers in line. Maybe this is another reason that you two…" Snape cut off his sentence and looked at Ginny. Hermione and Draco understood what he was trying to say though. Maybe this is another reason that their blood bond took place, they were destined to be together.

"Why do you two have those runes in the first place?"

"Ginny, it's definitely a good thing you're sitting down right now. Remember that fight me and Draco got into at the beginning of the year?

Ginny nodded.

"Okay so it was a lot… worse than I had originally told you. We ended up hurting each other quite badly…"

Snape rolled his eyes and stepped forward.

"They killed each other, is what happened. When Albus and I entered the room they were both dead, even if just. And I mean JUST, I'm pretty sure I saw Hermione's eyes roll beneath her eyelids a couple times. I performed the counter curse to the spells they used, and their blood was drawn back into their bodies, sealing the wounds. Unfortunately, before their blood was put back, it had mixed on the floor, and while they were crying and dying in each other's arms, they spoke about things and shared things, causing their souls to open. When I put the blood back… they ended up bonding. It was a risk I was willing to take, it was their own idiocy that caused it in the first place."

Ginny's eyes were wide.

"So you're actually married?"

"Yes."

"Wow… so much stuff is starting to make sense."

"You can't tell anyone, Ginny."

"I wouldn't!"

"I know, but I just had to say it out loud."

Hermione glanced up at Draco, causing their eyes to lock again.

"This is the most irritating part about the whole situation, to be completely honest."

"Ah yes, the eyes. I have some theories."

Draco groaned, studying the gold irises of his wife.

"Just theories?"

"Yes, Mr. Malfoy. As of now they are only theories. I think when you two were dying and telling each other… whatever it was you were telling each other, that you opened your souls, as Professor Snape has already mentioned. Since you had a blood bond almost immediately after that, I think your souls recognize each other through your eyes and causes you to have a hard time to look away."

"So this is going to happen for the rest of our lives? I find myself scared to look at her any time we are in the presence of others. I can't sit there staring into her eyes during lessons or meals!"

Draco tore his eyes away from Hermione finally.

"It is honestly so irritating, it's like I can't do anything to make myself stop, even though I try and force them away the whole time."

"I never said it's going to last forever, Mr. Malfoy."

"Great, how do we stop it?"

"Consummate your bond."

Hermione almost choked and then turned bright red.

"Consummating your bond will help you in many ways, and I know it's exceptionally awkward to hear this from your Headmaster, but it's the truth. It'll keep your headaches at bay for longer when you're apart and you'll be able to go farther distances from each other without a headache occurring, it'll help you communicate in your minds better, which will be a great advantage for the both of you. When you're feeling like you are right now, totally drained, it will bring your energy levels back up, it's called reconnecting or recharging with each other. It'll make the pain you each feel at each other's expense a little bit more bearable, depending on what's causing the pain - unless someone is going against the bond - that will still be incredibly painful, and it'll stop your eyes from locking. Your souls need to recognize each other, they're different than your blood."

Hermione nodded slowly.

Madam Pomfrey came forward with two vials of pepper-up potion and gave them to the two students, "Take these and go back to your common room. If anything more at all occurs, please come back here straight away."

"Miss. Weasley? Bedtime."

Ginny stood up and gave Hermione and Draco an awkward look before exiting the hospital doors.

"We need to have a discussion tomorrow, or whenever you two have your energy back, about what is going to occur with the war now. As soon as you are both feeling up to it, please come straight to my office."

"Yes, Sir," they said in unison, "have a good night."

/

Hermione was nervous for the entire walk back to their common room. They had some answers finally, but she realized that if they both wanted their energy back sometime this week and if they wanted to have their meeting with Dumbledore soon that she would just have to swallow her pride and allow Draco to take her.

It wasn't that big of a deal, she resolutely told herself, he was her husband and it wasn't as though she would ever be able to be with anyone else in her life now anyway.

"You alright?"

"Just processing all of the information we were given."

"It's a lot. Who would have ever thought that we would be elementals? We can do great things together, Hermione. Maybe the bonding was destined to happen…"

Hermione entered their common room and headed straight for Draco's room, not waiting for him to figure out what she was doing. She steeled herself as she went through his door and immediately pulled off her shirt.

"What are you doing?"

"I'm exhausted, and I'm tired of being exhausted. I'm sick of these stupid headaches and I'm getting increasingly annoyed by our eyes locking up. We both know what we need to do in order to make things better."

Draco stared at her in disbelief.

"Hermione, we don't have to do this right this second."

"I want to."

"Are you sure about this?"

"You're going to be the only person for me anyway, so what does it matter?"

"I just thought you would have wanted it to be… I don't know… special maybe?"

"You have the rest of our lives to make me feel special, as for right now… I just want to have my old energy back. Draco, I'm tired of not being able to focus on the most simple of things."

Hermione removed her pants and stood in his bedroom in her knickers, feeling scared but also resolved. She had made her decision.

She moved to Draco and started to pull his shirt off, but he was slightly reluctant.

Once she had his shirt off she stood on her toes and pressed her mouth to his, their bodies flush, and the passion that was always ready to ignite between them caught and he found that he wanted this right now too. He moved her to his bed, not breaking the kiss and that's where he slowly took his wife for the first time. Carefully and gently, the passion almost overwhelming. As their copulation was coming to a close the white light that always occurred during their more passionate kisses exploded out, causing a blinding light and a disruption in the magic throughout almost the entire castle.

"I feel a million times better," Hermione breathed into Draco's slightly sweaty chest as sleep was overtaking her.

"Me too," he whispered into her hair, clinging onto her body tightly, loving the way she felt against him and he realized that this was the first time he had ever _made love_ to someone. Usually it was quick and hard, he was glad that his first time with his wife was more than that.


	6. Chapter 6

**A/N- I don't own Harry Potter, unfortunately.**

 **Chapter 6**

Draco woke the next morning to a tousle headed Hermione. She was snuggled into his left side with her left arm thrown across his stomach, her head resting slightly on his chest and her wild curls almost choking him.

He smiled to himself and moved her hair over, looking down at her arm.

That's when he saw it.

He sat up quickly, jostling Hermione awake and pulling her arm up to his eyes.

"Oh Merlin…"

"What?" Hermione asked groggily, trying to sit up and pull her arm away from his grasp. "What is that?!"

"We need to go to Dumbledore, now. Get dressed!"

Draco jumped out of his bed and moved to his wardrobe, ruffling through clothes haphazardly before choosing and starting to pull them on. Hermione remained sitting and studied the new mark on her left arm. Fear bubbled in her stomach at her first glance, thinking that it was the Dark Mark. It obviously wasn't, since it was black and not red.

"What is this…?"

"That would be the Malfoy family crest, which means that at any point my parents will realize that I've married. My mother has one, I just thought that it showed up right after the wedding. I didn't realize that it showed up after the marriage was consummated instead."

Hermione's eyes were wide, staring down at the black elaborate "M" on her arm.

"Why didn't you warn me?!"

"I just figured since you didn't have it after the bonding that it wasn't going to show. I thought maybe it had it to be a specific type of ceremony or something."

"How will your parents know?"

"Go get dressed."

It was a command, not a request, and that was something that always irked Hermione, especially so early in the morning.

"But how will they know?!"

"Go!"

Hermione huffed and stood up, not embarrassed in the least about her nakedness around Draco and left his room, but not before glaring at him from the doorway.

She met him in the common room a few minutes later with her hair pulled into a messy bun and her muggle clothes on, since it was a Saturday. She was wearing tight fitting jeans and a dark blue long sleeved shirt with a v neck.

Draco was wearing his casual clothes as well, which consisted of black dress pants and a light blue button down shirt.

Hermione smiled for a moment, seeing his casual wear.

Her husband really was a handsome man.

"Let's go!"

"How will your parents know?" she asked again as they were walking down the empty halls. It was still early on a Saturday so there weren't any other students wandering around yet.

If they both weren't so concerned they would have noticed how much better they felt. The best they had both felt since that fateful night.

Draco didn't answer, and when Hermione looked at him she could tell he was deep in thought.

She kept her mouth shut and they arrived in front of the gargoyles that guarded Dumbledore's office.

"Licorice wand."

"You two look spritely this morning!" Dumbledore said as a greeting when the couple entered his office.

"We have a problem," Draco ground out, "Professor Snape should probably be here for this."

"I'm already here, Mr. Malfoy."

Draco seemed to relax slightly, but he pulled Hermione forward and lifted her left sleeve, showing both men her newly marked arm.

"I was expecting that," Snape said, moving forward and inspecting Hermione's arm.

"A warning would have been nice," she replied scathingly.

"What will we do?"

"I expect your father to show up any time now."

Draco paled, and Hermione shared his apprehension.

"What are we going to say?"

"Tell him the truth, Draco."

"How would he already know, Professor Snape?"

"He has a tapestry of the family tree in his office; you undoubtedly will have been added, at this point. Once the mark is in place the person is added to the tapestry automatically."

"Oh."

Hermione glanced at Draco and they shared a look of fright.

Draco took a deep breath and sat down heavily on an empty chair as Hermione moved closer to him, scared of what was going to happen. She stood behind Draco, near the corner of the room and as soon as she was leaning against the wall the headmaster's office door flung open and Lucius Malfoy stormed into the room.

He held his usual snake-head cane in one hand and looked absolutely furious.

Hermione felt herself cower back just at the mere sight of him. She normally wouldn't have shown her fear, but everything was different now. This man, no matter how she would like to spin it, was her father-in-law, and she knew that he hated her before, never mind now. Now that she had ruined Draco's chances at a pure blooded marriage, with pure blood babies running around their ridiculous manor, she knew she was going to be in for it. Add in the fact that she now knew for sure now that Lucius was a Death Eater... well, anyway, she was scared spitless.

"What have you done, boy?!"

Draco stood up quickly and straightened his spine.

"It was an accident."

Lucius looked confused for a moment before sneering at his son, obviously not believing it. Really, who starts something like this off by claiming a marriage was an accident? No one would believe that, and Hermione couldn't help but understand why Lucius would just brush that off.

"Honestly, it was."

"If you would just take a seat, Mr. Malfoy, we can explain everything."

"I would like to speak to Draco alone," Lucius spit out, glaring at Dumbledore and advancing on Draco. When he was close enough his hand closed around Draco's upper arm so he could pull him from the room and he spotted Hermione at the last second, who had been effectively hidden when Draco stood from his chair.

Lucius blinked and stopped for a moment before he resumed pulling Draco from the room.

/

Hermione sat in the chair that Draco just vacated and waited, she knew if she was to follow it would only cause more problems. She could feel the fear and hate that Draco was obviously emanating and was only hoping that he could keep it together; Dumbledore and Snape were watching Hermione closely and she was intending on keeping her face as blank as she possibly could.

 _Don't worry._

 _How can I not be worried? What's happening?_

Draco didn't answer, instead Hermione felt a searing pain across her back, on her ribs. Her eyes widened momentarily, but she quickly made her features blank again.

"We have a lot of things to figure out, Miss. Granger."

"I know, Professor."

Dumbledore sighed as Hermione's eyes widened again, this time she felt a stinging pain on her cheek.

"We need to figure out a way to keep the pain to a minimum for you, Draco will be feeling a lot more in the future if he's going to end up doing what I think he will."

"What do you think he will do, Sir?"

Dumbledore and Snape exchanged a glance and Dumbledore said, "I think you'll have to tell him about your situation, Severus, maybe it'll help him realize what he needs to do."

Snape nodded, his eyes flashing slightly.

"And Lucius?"

"I think it would be beneficial to tell the entire Malfoy together, when the time is right and if Lucius has made the choice to assist his son."

Both teachers looked back to Hermione seconds before she fell forward off of her chair, her body convulsing before she even slammed into the floor. Whimpers were escaping her lips as her eyes rolled in her head, the whites showing more than anything. The pain was like a thousand white hot knives piercing her muscles and ligaments, it felt like it was tearing them from her bones.

As suddenly as it began it stopped.

"Severus, go retrieve Draco and Lucius, please, this has gone far enough."

Hermione huddled on the floor in front of the chair for a few moments, she drew her knees up to her chin and rested it on them, her hands clasped in front of her legs, tears streaming down her face. If she felt that pain, she couldn't imagine what it was that Draco had felt, she knew the residual pain wasn't nearly as bad as it was first hand.

She was angry, angrier than she could ever remember being. Who uses a curse like that for something out of everyone's control? On their own son, no less.

She hopped to her feet, anger pulsing through her body and Dumbledore looked over at her. He was shocked as he watched her hair start to whip around, fire in her eyes, she looked tense, like a spring that was recoiled before it was let free. The room was heating up with her anger and Dumbledore felt some sweat gathering on his brow as he watched the scene before him.

She looked at him, and suddenly the wooden chair across the room was on fire.

Hermione's eyes widened in surprise and she could feel the power crackling in her finger-tips. She reigned in the energy trying to get herself together, and when she did she slumped back onto the floor, tired.

Angry, confused, hurt.

She stayed on the floor, tears leaking from her eyes again as Dumbledore extinguished the chair and then just stood by silently and watched her. The door opened a few moments later and Snape came back into the office followed closely by Mr. Malfoy, Draco bringing up the rear. He rushed to Hermione quickly, kneeling down beside her and wrapping his arms around her, guilt pulsating off of him.

"What's wrong with the girl?" Lucius Malfoy drawled, eyeing her disdainfully.

 _Are you okay?_

 _I'm fine, Hermione._

 _It was so painful, I can't imagine how much worse it was for you._

He tightened his arms around her and she slowly slithered hers around his torso.

 _I'm okay, honestly._

 _Does this happen often? Should I be prepared for this on a regular basis?_

 _It happens often enough. I apologize for not warning you in advance._

 _A warning wouldn't have done anything, Draco, I have never felt the Cruciatus Curse before, I wouldn't have known what to expect._

Draco sighed, and then glanced up to see all of the adults standing there staring at them. He stood up slowly, his leg muscles almost refusing to hold him, and then pulled Hermione up too.

Snape gave them an annoyed look.

"Sorry, Professor Snape."

He gave a nod of his head and directed his attention back to Lucius.

"What was Draco able to tell you?"

"Enough. He has blood bonded with the ingrate."

"That's unnecessary, Mr. Malfoy."

Lucius bristled visibly.

"I don't see how you can say that, Dumbledore, my son; my pure-blooded heir to the Malfoy fortune, has blood bonded, _married_ , a mudblood-" Draco made a sound low in his throat, "- and I only found out months after the fact, after he lowered himself enough to consummate with her."

Hermione never felt lower than she did at that moment. Draco slithered his hand into hers, linking their fingers together tightly.

"What's done is done, father, we can only move ahead from here. There's no turning away from this."

Dumbledore moved forward suddenly, "I think I'll just go get some breakfast, leave you four to it." He vacated his office quickly and Hermione and Draco shared a slightly confused look.

"What do you propose we do about this, Draco?" Lucius hissed the second the stone stairs stopped moving outside of the door.

Draco sighed.

"I don't know, father."

"I can't even begin to tell you how ashamed I am."

 _Like that's something new._

 _We knew he would be upset, Draco, this ruins so much._

 _It doesn't ruin anything. It could be the best thing to happen for my family, for me._

 _He would never see it that way._

"Stop!"

"Sorry, Professor."

"What the bloody hell is going on?!"

"Draco can explain that all to you, but first we need a plan."

"I'm not talking about this here."

"Lucius…"

"I'm not. We need to speak somewhere safer. Draco, I expect you to be at the Manor this evening."

"We can't do it at the Manor, Lucius," Snape said, giving a very pointed look in Hermione's direction.

"Well then I expect you and your _wife_ -" Lucius spit the word out, as if having it in his mouth for longer than a second would poison him, "- to meet your mother and I for dinner in Hogsmeade this evening. I won't be informing her of the new events, and she won't see the tapestry. I will let you have the honours of ruining your mother's hopes and dreams for you."

With that he stormed toward the fireplace and disappeared from their view since people were able to floo out of Hogwarts from the Headmaster's office, just not in.

Hermione let out a breath.

"I accidentally set one of Professor Dumbledore's chairs on fire," she said, attempting to lighten the mood.

"What?"

She explained everything as they walked down to the Great Hall for breakfast, where Hermione mostly pushed her food around on her plate and stressed out about meeting with Draco's parent's that evening.


	7. Chapter 7

**Chapter 7**

Draco took Hermione's hand on their walk to Hogsmeade once they were out of sight from the castle. She was trembling and he could feel the anxiety she was experiencing in his stomach.

 _It'll be fine_

 _They hate me. They already hated me and now they'll hate me more._

 _There's nothing to be done, now._

 _I can't even imagine how much your mother is going to loathe me, she's going to be beyond disappointed._

 _She… might not hate you as much as you think._

 _What do you mean?_

 _She's been forced into a lot of things in her life, Hermione._

 _Oh._

Hermione took a deep breath and Draco reluctantly dropped her hand as they approached the village even though he doubted anyone they knew would be here, he didn't want to take any chances at this point. Hermione even reached up and pulled the hood of her cloak low around her face, shielding it from view. They approached the restaurant and as soon as they entered they were whisked off to a private room.

"Darling!"

Hermione hung back and removed her cloak as Draco was pulled into a hug by his mother, even though the second the hood left Hermione's face, Narcissa was staring at her, wide-eyed and confused.

She hesitated before stepping back to her chair, glancing at Hermione.

Hermione took another deep breath and advanced toward the table, sitting down in a fluid movement as Draco sat beside her.

Narcissa continued to look confused as Lucius avoided all eye contact with his son.

"How are things at the manor?" Draco asked, after making sure there was a silencing charm in place around their private room.

"Not so great," Narcissa replied, but seemed reluctant to say more as her eyebrows once again furrowed as she looked towards Hermione.

"It's okay to speak about it in front of her, mother. Maybe some introductions are in order first, though."

Draco took a deep breath, which was mirrored by Hermione. Tension was thick in the air and Narcissa sat up a little straighter, waiting for the blow.

"Mother, this is Hermione… my wife."

Narcissa's reaction would have been comical if the proceedings weren't so dire. Her eyes widened and her cheeks flamed bright red as she stuttered for a few moments. Her hands fluttered up to her face, but being the woman that she was, with the exceptional breeding that she had, she quickly composed herself and reached her hand out. She knew Draco would explain everything in due time and that he would have a good reason for marrying the girl before her.

"Hermione."

Hermione took her hand and shook it, timidly. She wanted to greet the woman in front of her politely, but found that the words were stuck in her throat. She nodded instead, trying to smile.

"May I ask how this came to be?"

 _You tell her._

 _Hermione…_

 _Nope! You tell her!_

 _Where's your Gryffindor courage?_

Hermione scoffed slightly.

 _It seems to have been evading me lately._

 _Fine. Get ready for this._

Narcissa was looking at them closely, and Hermione realized they still hadn't mastered communicating without people noticing. Her scoff probably didn't help.

Lucius still had yet to speak, but he was now looking at the couple curiously, as though he couldn't help himself from wondering how this took place, since Draco hadn't given him details earlier.

"Well," Draco started, but the waiter then entered the room and took their food and drink orders. He waited until the waiter returned with their orders, and then proceeded to tell them what had happened; how they had blood bonded by mistake and as a direct result to that were technically married. He explained how they couldn't be too far away from each other for an extended period of time and even told his parents about he had tried to refuse the bond initially and almost killed them both; although he was clearly ashamed when explaining the latter. His mother's facial expressions changed constantly while he told the story. Fearful, worried, grateful, happiness – they all flitted across her features during the story, and Hermione liked her for it. She wasn't sitting there as though made from stone, like her husband and Hermione felt a surge of gratitude toward Narcissa. She cared more than anything for Draco, which was clear as day.

Lucius also seemed to realize what else this meant.

"So Hermione must be kept safe in order for you to survive."

"That's right, father. And I think you should also know that we can feel each other's pain."

Lucius looked toward the girl sharply, understanding why she was on the floor that morning. He gave a slight nod, but that was it.

Not that she had expected an apology. She was honestly just glad that no one had cursed her yet.

"We can also communicate in our minds."

This was the first thing Hermione said since Draco started to tell the story, and Narcissa and Lucius both looked at her in surprise. She wasn't sure if it was because neither had _ever_ heard her speak before, or if it was because she broke the silence and said something fairly unexpected.

Draco smiled at her.

"This is… beyond interesting. I have never actually met someone who was blood bound."

"It can be frustrating at times. I can definitely do without the headaches that sometimes plague us."

Hermione nodded her agreement, pushing her plate away from her.

"You need to eat more."

Hermione looked at Draco in surprise.

"Sorry?"

"You haven't been eating much, lately, you need to eat more."

Hermione sighed before looking at him crossly and taking a sip of water.

 _Don't make me argue with you in front of your parents, Draco._

"I'm just not all that hungry right now, too much has been going on."

"I've just noticed that you've lost a considerable amount of weight since the beginning of the year."

"Jeez, I wonder why that could be?" Hermione replied shortly. Yes, she had lost weight. She could barely eat thanks to all of the stress she had been going through. She had happy times with Draco, but lying to her friends and the resulted stress of hiding everything about herself from an entire castle full of people wasn't exactly an easy, stress-free task. She could eat small amounts at a time and knew she wasn't getting enough, but the constant anxiety in the pit of her stomach wasn't doing her any favours.

"We'll talk about it later."

Narcissa smiled knowingly and changed the subject, "Are you going to tell anyone about this?"

"Ginny Weasley knows, she found out by accident; I'm thinking about informing Blaise and Pansy."

Narcissa sighed, "They should know, Draco, you can't keep something like this from your friends, and you know they wouldn't say a word. How are you two doing? I'm sure it's hard to keep up appearances."

Hermione shrugged and Draco nodded.

"What are the plans for Christmas eve, then? Are you going home to your parents, Hermione?"

"Hermione and I are staying at the school for the entirety of the holidays, mother," Draco said, standing from the table.

"We still have things to discuss, Draco."

"Not tonight, father. We're both tired."

"Then when?! This is important!"

"Before the holidays are through, just owl me and we can meet."

"I've made your excuses for now Draco, saying you're too busy at school to attend any meetings until at least after the winter break, which is why you haven't been summoned yet."

Draco nodded.

"I'll owl you with details of when we will meet again, later. It was wonderful to meet you, Hermione."

"You as well, Mrs. Malfoy."

"Oh no, dear. Please call me Narcissa, especially since I believe we share the same title now."

Hermione's face flushed slightly.

"She will not be referred to as that until after the war, mother, we can't risk a slip up."

"Of course, dear."

Draco pulled Hermione from the room by her hand after she had donned her cloak and pulled up her hood, not waiting for Lucius to say anything else. He thought about going to Dumbledore for help the entire walk to the castle, he knew the Dark Lord was staying at the family Manor and didn't want his parents in unnecessary danger, but he also had to think of himself and Hermione.

Everything was so complicated.

His father really got them in deep.

/

"Let's work on our elemental powers."

Draco was bored. Everyone would be back from their vacation in a few days and he was surprised that his parents hadn't come to visit yet. Hermione was dozing on the couch but he wanted to do something.

"Hermione!"

"Go away."

"Get your arse up, let's go practice our powers! This is the perfect time to do it since we're basically alone here."

He slapped her on the butt.

"Damn it, Malfoy, go away!"

"No."

She cracked an eye and he was standing in front of her, staring down at her with a mischievous look on his face.

"Let's go!"

"And where are we going to work on them?"

"Outside, of course."

Hermione yawned and stretched, the rune on her hip peeking out from underneath her shirt. Every time Draco saw it something in his heart plucked. That was _his_ name on her body, after all.

"It's cold out."

"Of course it is, it's winter. Get up!"

Hermione sat up slowly and glared at him.

"I'm going to put on more layers before I even think about stepping outside."

He smiled.

"Spoiled prat."

"Bush-head."

She looked at him, surprised. He had never called her that before.

He laughed.

/

"I can't do it."

"That has got to be one for the record books, Hermione Granger, can't do something?"

"I don't know how to focus my energy properly yet!" she snapped, "You aren't making any more progress than I am, Mr. Holier-than-thou"

Draco felt a quick sensation of power and tried to grasp at it with his mind so he could focus on it, but it was fleeting. He focused harder and felt his mind grab an edge of it, Hermione's taunting seemed to give him more of a reason to focus.

She gasped loudly as Draco's hair started to move in a way that wasn't caused by the faint breeze outside, and Draco felt a chill seconds before the target they were working on (a tree) iced up.

"Oh, Draco!"

He tried to focus his attention on it, letting the power radiate out of his hands instead of his wand, but it was dwindling.

He broke his attention, feeling drained and dropped his hands to his sides.

"Who's making more progress than who, now?"

Hermione grumbled, glaring at him.

"Maybe it's working for you because we're in your element."

"We can't just go hang out in fire, Hermione. We should be able to use these powers no matter where we are or what we are doing."

"Yes, eventually, but not for the first time. Let's go in, I'm freezing."

Draco nodded and followed her out of the forest. They had went in a couple hundred yards so they weren't spotted by any of the few students at school. It wouldn't be easy to explain what they were doing and why they were spending time together outside.

They entered their common room, Hermione laughing at Draco's bragging, deciding not to take it to heart. She knew he was doing it on purpose and she was proud of his accomplishments.

Her laughter was cut short when she realized that Mr. and Mrs. Malfoy were lounging in their common room, drinking tea.

"Finally! Where were you?"

"Walking around outside. What are you doing here?"

"We have come for our talk, I know we're a few days late but we were otherwise indisposed at the Manor."

Hermione went into the kitchen as Draco moved forward to sit down. She came out a few moments later with two mugs in her hands, handing Draco his coffee before she sat down beside him, looking nervous.

"What are we going to do, Draco?"

"I have made a decision and I know you won't like it mother but it's something I have to do. I can't sit idly by. I'm sure you won't agree either father, but at this point it's all about staying alive and I'm sorry to say, but if the Dark Lord wins… Hermione will be killed."

"And you will die right along with her."

"Yes." Draco honestly wasn't even thinking about that, he just knew that he couldn't let the Dark Lord win. He desperately didn't want her to go through the things that Death Eaters put muggles and muggle-born witches and wizards through.

His parents didn't look surprised at his words.

"You will turn spy? For the light?"

"Yes."

"He's expecting you at the manor before the Christmas holidays are over, Draco. I tried to make your excuses but he wasn't hearing it. He wants to see you and I can't stop it anymore."

Draco nodded.

"Have you decided how you're going to go about this?"

"What are you going to do, father?" Draco asked, instead of answering.

"I will aid you."

Hermione and Draco both looked shocked.

"You didn't honestly expect me to sit and watch my only son struggle to keep himself and his wife alive, did you? I know we rarely see eye to eye on things, but I never expected you to try to do this alone."

Draco nodded, thinking about what he could do.

"Well I guess I'll go to his meetings and do his bidding, I need him to trust me."

"We do need that, yes."

Hermione jumped when there was a knock at the door, and she hurried to answer it, barely opening the door.

"Hermione."

"Professors, what are you both doing here?"

"We have come to talk with everyone. We must speak to Lucius and Draco, I need to know their plans."

Hermione nodded and stepped back to let Dumbledore and Snape enter the room, feeling nervous. Was Snape about to inform them that he has been working for the light this whole time?

"Severus. What are you doing here?"

Lucius sounded surprised and also slightly guilty.

"I've come to see what your plans are."

Tension was thick in the air, Lucius and Severus were sizing each other up while Draco just sat by looking slightly confused.

 _What's going on? Why is Snape here?_

 _Draco…_

 _Does this have anything to do with the reason that you called him to our aid?_

 _Yes._

 _He's a spy, isn't he?_

 _I'm sure he is here to talk about everything._

 _Hermione…_

"You've been working for the light this whole time, haven't you Professor?"

 _Draco!_

Snape was looking at Draco, caught off guard.

"Yes," he said simply, "And my reasons were almost the same as yours, Draco."

Lucius inhaled sharply, he and Narcissa were both watching Snape closely.

"What do you mean?" Draco asked.

Hermione was interested now. She had never been told why Snape was working for the light, but she knew the reason was intense. Dumbledore refused to speak of it.

"I myself was once in love with a muggle-born witch that I met long before we both came to Hogwarts to study. She was perfect. She was brilliant and beautiful and everything I wanted. Once we were a little bit older I started to hang out with the wrong types of people, and she couldn't stand it. One day, in my anger, I shouted at her and called her a mudblood, pushing her past her breaking point. We had been drifting apart long before that, but that was her last straw. She wouldn't speak to me, wouldn't listen to my apologies – she wanted nothing to do with me, and Merlin, I loved her. I wanted her to be happy, so I finally left her alone. She graduated and married and I became a Death Eater, just like I always knew I would. I heard a prophecy, stating that a boy who had the power to defeat the Dark Lord would be born at the end of July, and the Dark Lord took this to mean _her_ son – " Hermione inhaled sharply, staring at Snape with a look of understanding dawning her features," - I begged him to leave her alive, to not murder the love of my life but he did it anyway. He murdered her, even after I begged of him to leave her be, that the prophecy was not necessarily aimed at her family. I wanted to die, because it was my fault too, I'm the one who told him of the prophecy in the first place. I went straight to Dumbledore after she was murdered and I've been working for him ever since."

Narcissa had tears in her eyes and Hermione was still staring at Snape, horrified.

"I still love her, even though she has been gone for 17 years, Draco. This is why I was pushing you when you were trying to refuse the bond, not only to keep you alive, but so you could experience the love that I once had. I knew you would find it with Miss. Granger, and I'm beyond happy that it has happened."

"Who was the woman, professor Snape?" Draco thought he had figured it out but he wanted to hear it out loud instead of just assuming.

Snape's eyes met Hermione's and he nodded solemnly.

"Harry's mother? Lily Potter?"

"Yes," he said quietly, with a slight nod.

"Does Harry know?"

"Not that I am aware of, and I would honestly prefer to keep it that way."

"Yes, Sir."

"So you see, Draco. You and your father wouldn't be alone in your secret quest to bring the Dark Lord down from the inside. It isn't easy, and you will have to study occlumency and legilimancy hard in order to keep your secrets safe, but I have faith in you and I think with the three of us working together… I think we could succeed."

"My aunt Bellatrix has been teaching me occlumency since she escaped Azkaban. I can keep people out effectively. Well, not Hermione, but other people."

"Good, we'll continue working on that. You will need to learn legilimency as well, but that isn't as pressing. How about you, Lucius? You've been awfully quiet about everything."

"I'm just surprised. I never would have suspected you."

"Good. It needs to stay that way."

"What about our connection? Professor Dumbledore… you told me we had to learn how to lessen our pain connection if Draco is going to go through with this. He has to go to a meeting in a few days, that isn't enough time for us to learn."

"We will do what we can, Miss. Granger. You both may need to be put into positions where one of you is being harmed while you both try to fight off the pain."

"You mean to torture us on purpose so that we can learn to shut it out?"

"Yes, Mr. Malfoy."

Narcissa looked scandalized. "You are not purposely attacking my son!"

"It will be for the best, Narcissa," Lucius said, "They need to learn."

Without warning Lucius pointed his wand at Draco, casting the unforgivable Cruciatus curse. He was doing this to prove a point to Narcissa and Draco's body tensed before he fell to his knees off of the couch, shouting in pain. Narcissa tried to grab his wand but Lucius moved away quickly and watched Hermione writhe on the floor at the same time as Draco, both in obvious pain, both groaning and their eyes rolling; although, Draco seemed to be in more pain than Hermione was experiencing.

He lifted his wand and stopped the curse.

Narcissa seemed to be at a loss for words.

Hermione groaned, tears running down her cheeks before jumping to her feet, rage in her eyes.

"Calm down, Miss. Granger."

Her hair, once again, began to whip around as her fiery eyes glowed eerily.

"If you ever do that to your son again, I will personally go for you!" she yelled, her hair whipping faster. She was glaring at Lucius with her frightening eyes, and Draco reached forward to touch her.

"No, Draco! Don't touch her!"

Draco ignored Dumbledore and clasped his hand around her bicep, while Narcissa watched on in shock, for her son's eyes started glowing as well. The room wasn't able to stay a temperature, so it continuously fluctuated between searing hot and ice cold.

Hermione was emitting red sparks now, they were shooting out of her fingers while Draco was shooting off blue ones and before anyone could do anything, she reached toward the couch in front of Lucius and it was suddenly aflame.

"Next time you do that to Draco it'll be you on fire, Mr. Malfoy!"

"Hermione!" Draco shouted, but instead of sounding angry, he sounded excited.

"What's happening?" Narcissa asked, scared, as she moved across the room away from the two students and the burning couch.

Draco reached forward and energy shot out of his hands, not only extinguishing the couch, but layering a thin sheet of ice over it.

They turned to each other, joy on their faces, and hugged tightly, their energy pulsating throughout the room, causing knick-knacks on shelves to explode. Their hair was flowing around them wildly now, and their eyes dimmed, but they still held their fire and ice qualities in their irises. Hermione and Draco leaned in to each other and kissed, triumphantly, causing more sparks to fly and everything in their common room started rattling, their coffee cups shaking hard on the table.

They stared in each other's eyes, trying to reign in their power until it slowly started to lessen.

"What was that?!" Narcissa broke their concentration and they both slumped onto the couch they had vacated when Lucius cast his curse, clasping each other's hands tightly and looking incredibly exhausted.

"That, my dear Narcissa, was their elemental powers."

She gasped.

"Neither of them mentioned that they had them."

"We are still trying to work on them, we didn't want anyone to know about them yet." Draco's words were slurred slightly.

"They weren't aware that they possessed them until after their bond. Draco caught one of his fellow Slytherins hurting Hermione and that's the first time his showed. Hermione's first time, as far as I am aware, was in my office after Lucius hurt Draco last week. It seems their protection of each other is the main cause for the powers to show themselves, at least for now. Once they're able to control them, they will be a formidable match."

"Wow," Lucius breathed, reaching forward to touch the frosted, sooty couch as if not believing it.

"It is quite shocking at first. Hermione set a chair on fire in my office."

Draco chuckled tiredly and looked at his wife, her eyes were drooping and she leaned into him.

Everyone except the students were still standing from the little scene they just witnessed and Dumbledore turned to Lucius and Narcissa, "Why don't I give you a tour of the school?"

"I'm on the Board of Governors, Dumbledore, I know what the school looks like."

"I think we need to leave… Draco and Hermione need to reconnect in order to gain some energy back. Once they have better control over it they won't have to recharge themselves so suddenly, but at this point, they definitely need to. Why don't we go for a walk and then we can reconvene here for dinner?"

Draco nodded, already standing up and pulling Hermione to her feet to lead her to his bedroom.

"What do you mean, reconnect?" Narcissa asked curiously, watching her son.

"They need to have sex, Narcissa," Snape said, taking obvious enjoyment when her cheeks reddened and Lucius spluttered from behind the now melting couch.


	8. Chapter 8

**Chapter 8**

"I'm worried."

"I know."

"I don't want you to go."

Draco turned to Hermione, a look of sadness marring his handsome face. "I don't want to go either, but I don't have a choice. I need to do this."

Hermione took a deep breath.

"We haven't even effectively shut off our pain, yet! This is a bad idea."

"Just… if you feel anything, just keep trying to shut it out. You can do it, I know you can."

Hermione felt tears pricking her eyes and then felt foolish, she wasn't a crier. She turned away so Draco wouldn't see.

"Hey, regardless of what happens, I'll be coming back here tonight. Everything will be fine. I'll keep my occlumency going and He will never know what has happened, what I have done."

Hermione nodded, her back still to Draco.

"Just be careful, okay?" She said it thickly, and he knew she was crying.

He embraced her, turning her in his arms so she was silently crying into his chest, her arms tight around his ribs.

"I'll be back later, just try and relax while I'm gone."

Hermione nodded again.

Dumbledore had opened the floo network from their common room so that Draco could floo to the Manor from there instead of having to go through the entire castle to the Headmaster's office. He would have to apparate to Hogsmeade once he was finished at his meeting and walk back to the castle though, there was no way for him to floo or apparate back into Hogwarts.

Draco lifted her left arm and kissed the 'M' on it, squeezed her one last time and put on his mask before he strode to the fireplace, flooing back to his home and away from the one place he wanted to be.

Hermione sat on the couch, waiting for him to return. It was going to be a long night.

/

"Ahh Draco, so nice of you to finally join us."

"So sorry, my Lord."

Draco gave a slight bow and moved to the open spot in the circle, beside his father.

"Why have you been otherwise indisposed, Draco?"

"I have a position in Hogwarts that has been taking much of my attention, my Lord. I've been made Head Boy."

"Ahh yes, a position that I know well. It does keep one quite busy. I trust from here on out that you will regularly make it to our meetings?"

"Yes, my Lord."

"We have a mission tonight." Voldemort stated, causing a shiver to run through the circle of Death Eaters. "I don't need all of you for this, in fact, I think I will keep the youngest ones here for this. We will not be travelling, the farthest you will need to go is to the dungeons. There are mudbloods there who were caught trying to form a resistance to our cause, and they need to be punished accordingly before they're finished off."

Draco felt his stomach tighten and tried to keep his mind blank, he hadn't been this far from Hermione before and he was unsure if she could get into his head from where she was, but he didn't want to take that chance. He couldn't let her know what was happening.

"Goyle, Crabbe, Nott, Flint, Malfoy, follow me. The rest of you are free to go for the night."

The seventeen year olds followed Voldemort out of the drawing room and down into the cold, dank dungeons until they reached a block of five cells. Each one held one person, which Draco was sure wasn't a coincidence, and each young Death Eater was ushered into a cell.

Draco cringed when he stood in front of the person he needed to torture and kill, he tried not to take in her appearance; if he looked at her like a person then this would be that much harder.

"Begin," Voldemort said in his high voice, obviously relishing the fact that he was able to control people so easily.

Draco heard the voices of his schoolmates ringing out in the dungeon, each shouting different curses and the shrieks of their victims filled the air.

"Is there a problem, Mr. Malfoy?"

Draco looked from the brunette muggle-born in front of him to the Dark Lord.

"No, Sir."

"Then get on with it."

Draco took a deep breath, trying his best to not compare this girl in front of him to his own wife, and called out "Crucio!"

"You have to mean it, Draco! That's the weakest Cruciatus curse I have _ever_ witnessed."

Draco felt like throwing up.

"Let me show you."

Draco looked back toward the girl, expecting Voldemort to curse her.

Draco's knees buckled as the curse tore into him, it was a thousand times worse than the ones that his father subjected him to, and he thought that his bones were going to break at any moment. He was surely going to die, right here in the dungeons below his family home.

"Do you understand now, Draco?" Voldemort asked as he ended the curse.

"Yes, Sir," Draco said, trying to keep his voice steady as he rose shakily to his feet, hoping he would be able to hold himself upright. He pushed down the feeling of his elemental power, he was in no way ready to reveal that yet.

"Try again."

Draco thought of Voldemort this time when he cast the curse, about how vile and disgusting he was to be making teenagers do this. He also, in a grudging sort of way, thought of himself, about how he had actually _wanted_ this at some point in his life. Not any time lately, but at some point he did and that made him sick.

The cries of pain emitting from the girl were showing that his curse was working effectively this time, and Voldemort was pleased.

"Sectumsempra, Draco, do it."

Draco did as he was told, watching large, bloody gashes appear on the girl before him, the girl who was so much like his wife that it made him almost physically ill to be following these orders.

"Crucio, Draco!"

Again, Draco did as he was told.

Again and again, until finally Voldemort told him to kill her. Draco was almost thankful, just so the poor girl could be put out of the pain and misery he was causing her.

"You may go back to school now, the next time you're summoned I expect you to be here promptly."

"Yes, Sir," Draco said, bowing once more and taking his leave.

He rushed out of the dungeon and through the drawing room, not even taking a moment to seek out his parents. He needed to get back to his room at school because he knew that he wasn't going to be able to keep it together for much longer. He all but ran through the front door and down the front path towards the gate; the moment he was through them he felt the suffocating feeling of apparition.

/

Hermione had retreated to her bedroom shortly after Draco left for the Manor. Her room had a feel of disuse; she didn't spend a lot of time in there lately, and she knew if she sat in front of the fire she would just drive herself mad.

She picked up her book bag and laid on her bed, spreading her parchment, textbooks, and quills before her. She did manage to lose herself in her work for a while, determined to stay away from Draco's mind. There was no way she was going to jeopardize his life by attempting to speak to him or hear any of his thoughts.

She studied until a blinding, blistering pain tore through her body, causing her to convulse harshly on her bedspread, gasping for air. Her body was being torn apart, of that she was sure, and no thought of trying to keep the pain at bay even crossed her mind.

The pain stopped abruptly and Hermione lay, taking deep breaths as tears dripped down her face slowly. She sat up shakily, and was thankful she was alone when that hit and not with any of her friends. They didn't need to see that.

If she was feeling the pain that intensely then what was Draco feeling? She couldn't help but pity him at that moment, and hope beyond anything that he would return alright.

She was studying again when she heard a thump from the common room and she stood up quickly, listening. She couldn't hear anything at all, until she heard the bathroom door slam closed.

Hermione waited on the couch for a long while before Draco finally emerged from the bathroom.

"Are you alright?"

He nodded and sat down beside her, she passed him a glass of water and he took a small sip, placing it on the table before he turned to her slightly.

"Did you feel it?"

She nodded slowly.

Draco swore loudly.

"It was worse than any I've ever felt before," he said, almost as if to himself. Hermione didn't reply because she didn't want him to know that it was much worse for her too.

Draco sighed.

"He made us torture muggle-borns."

Hermione gave him a sad look.

"Torture and kill, I should say. I'm lucky you're bound to me, because if you knew what I had done tonight you'd leave me for sure if you were able to."

"I wouldn't," Hermione whispered.

"The girl I was assigned to reminded me so much of you, I wanted to run out of those dungeons as fast as I could, and for some reason the Dark Lord accompanied me to my cell and spent all of his time there. My first Cruciatus wasn't strong enough so he showed me how it should be done. I'm so sorry you had to feel that, by the way, it was awful. He continued to order me to do different curses on the poor girl until I was fairly sure she was going to die just from the pain and blood loss. I was almost glad when he ordered me to kill her. How sick is that? I was glad to kill her."

"It's not sick, Draco. It's called empathy and it's a good thing you can feel it. If anyone can leave those dungeons tonight not feeling ill because of everything that took place than they are the sick ones. You wanted her pain to stop."

"The pain that I was causing her."

"Because you were forced to!"

Draco felt a lump in his throat, listening to her defend him against himself.

"Let's go to bed," he said around the lump, his eyes stinging as he reached for her hand and pulled her with him to his room.

Hermione took an old t-shirt of his and changed into it before climbing between his sheets. Draco threw on a pair of boxers before climbing into bed and pulling her body into his tightly, holding on as if he would drown without using her as a way to keep afloat.

Hermione could feel his tears dripping onto her head and she just held tightly onto his hand that was wrapped around her body, rubbing it until she fell asleep.

/

Hermione was sitting at the Gryffindor table a few days later with Harry, Ron and Ginny. They had arrived back from their holidays that morning. She met at them at the table a little later than usual, as it was a Sunday and she liked spending her Sunday mornings in bed with her husband.

"We have some news," Harry said quietly to Hermione, making sure no one outside the four of them could hear their words.

"About what?"

"You-Know-Who and his followers."

"Oh really? What kind of news."

Harry leaned in even closer, "Malfoy is one of them."

"What?" Hermione was stunned.

"Draco Malfoy, he's a Death Eater. I knew he would be involved with them sooner or later."

Hermione chanced a glance at Ginny and the red head looked incredibly concerned.

"How do you know that?"

"We have our sources. He was at a meeting a few nights ago, where he tortured and killed a muggle-born witch. I really don't want you sharing a common room with him. Not now."

Hermione pushed her plate away, she felt like she was doing that more often than not lately.

 _What's wrong?_

 _Invite Pansy and Blaise after breakfast, we're doing this now, all together._

Draco looked over at her from the Slytherin table, surprised.

"When you three are done your breakfast I want you to come up to my common room. I need to talk to you about a few things."

"Sure, Hermione! We haven't even been there yet! Hopefully Death Eater Malfoy won't be around to ruin the fun."

"I'll see you guys there, then!"

 _Wait up!_

 _Just meet me, I need to get away from them for a few minutes._

 _I can feel the anxiety rolling off of you in waves._

Hermione rolled her eyes and continued on her way to her common room, wanting to get there before anyone else. She needed to calm her nerves.

"What happened?"

She jumped and turned around just inside the common room. Draco was behind her.

"They know about what happened at your Manor the other night. I don't know how they know, but they do. They were talking about it and how it's unsafe for me to be sharing this room with you."

"So you want them to know everything, right now?"

Hermione looked at him sadly now, tears pooling in her eyes, trapped behind her eyelids.

"Yes. I do. They'll either accept it, or they won't, but at least the truth will be out."

Draco could feel the stress in the air, knew that she was having a hard time with the secrets and lies from her friends. Knew that she was trying her hardest to be strong during everything that had happened.

"Are you okay with this?" She asked him shakily, watching him to gauge his reaction.

"Yes. They'll find out sooner or later, and I personally think it's best if they hear it straight from us. Don't worry about it, everything will be fine."

Draco pulled her into his arms and kissed her deeply, trying to relieve some of her emotions. They broke apart and she laughed lightly, trying to mask her fear of rejection from her friends. At least she would always have Ginny on her side.

Pansy and Blaise entered the common room since Draco hadn't closed the door all the way and each of them gave Hermione a nasty look while stepping by her and moving towards the couches.

"I have something important to talk to you two about."

Draco took a seat in a chair.

 _Wait for my friends!_

 _I am. I'm just trying to soften the blow a little. They aren't going to be thrilled when your friends walk into the room._

Hermione sighed.

"Why is she still here?"

"Well, it's not actually just you two that I need to talk to. I also need to talk her friends as well."

"Draco, what's going on?" Blaise asked, his brows furrowed.

"In a few moments, Blaise."

"Oh, Merlin, you're dating her aren't you?" Pansy asked, giving Hermione a disdainful look.

"No." Draco said, and left it at that. It was the truth, after all.

Pansy looked relieved but her confusion was still evident.

Harry, Ron and Ginny made their way into the common room, and Ginny closed the door behind her. Harry and Ron stopped short when they saw the Slytherins already in the room, and looked as though they were itching to reach for their wands so they could curse Draco, but Ginny continued forward as if this happened every day. She took a seat in an empty armchair and gave Draco and Hermione a knowing, reassuring smile.

"What's going on?"

Pansy and Ron asked this at the same time.

 _Steel yourself, wife. I have a feeling this is going to be harder than it was with my parents._

Hermione took a deep breath and offered Ron and Harry a seat.

All eyes were on the couple now, but both of them seemed unable to say anything.

"What's going on Draco? You already told us that you two aren't dating, so that's off the table. What's with the joint meeting and all the tension?"

Ginny laughed. She was unable to contain it, the absurdity of the whole situation just caused her to laugh out loud, and Hermione smiled at her for it.

Some of the tension was lifted.

"Does Ginny know what's going on, Hermione?"

Hermione nodded, and she just decided to rip off the band-aid. She reached for her left sleeve and rolled it up quickly.

Harry and Ron were outraged, they thought at first that she was baring the Dark Mark, but upon closer inspection, it was an elaborate 'M'.

"Well, that's new," Ginny said, one eyebrow raised. Hermione didn't have the family crest the last time Ginny saw her.

"Oh. Bloody. Hell." Blaise said before he leaned forward and held his head in his hands.

"Draco…" Pansy started, but seemed unable to form a coherent sentence.

Ron was just red, red and blustering, as though he couldn't believe his eyes but was also unable to force any words from his lips.

Harry was confused.

He stood from his seat and moved closer to Hermione, inspecting her arm closely.

"What is it?"

"Draco! How could you have married her?! When did you even have time to do this? Do your parents know?! How did you end up with her, of all people!?"

"Married?" Harry breathed, looking at Hermione as though she had personally set out to hurt him.

"There's more," Draco stated, ignoring Pansy's outburst and lifting his shirt.

Hermione followed suit.

Everyone stood still for a moment, staring at the runes that had been bared on the couples' bodies.

"What on earth is that!?"

"Everyone sit down, please. We have so much explaining to do, and everything will make sense in the end."

Ron still looked angrier than anyone had ever seen him, and Harry still looked betrayed. Pansy and Blaise looked curious, while Ginny stood up and headed for the small adjoined kitchen as though she didn't have a care in the world, knowing she would be back in time for the juicy part of the story – Draco at Malfoy Manor.

"Would anyone like something to drink?

Hermione smiled gratefully and everyone asked for either a water or a tea, which Ginny went into the kitchen to get.

Draco began to tell the same story that he shared with his mother and father a couple weeks previously. Ginny came out after a few minutes and passed the drinks around accordingly.

Hermione suddenly felt faint and Draco felt it too, cutting his sentence off and whipping his head around to face her.

"Are you okay?!"

Everyone looked at them, confused.

"I… I think so…"

He watched her for another minute and then continued speaking where he left off, as though there wasn't an interruption.

"So when does the mark on Hermione's arm come into play?" Harry asked, obviously wanting to understand what the markings were, more than understand at the moment what "blood bonding" all pertained to.

"The marks on our hips are each other's names, a sign of our blood bond. People don't really recognize them anymore because blood bonding is mostly a thing of the past. The marking on Hermione's arm is actually the Malfoy family crest."

"She didn't have that that night in the hospital wing, though," Ginny pointed out, slightly confused.

Hermione blushed and Draco smiled.

Harry spluttered and Ron looked outraged that Ginny was aware of their marriage and didn't say a single word about it.

"You knew?! You knew and didn't say anything?!" Ron yelled, jumping to his feet and glaring at Ginny fiercely.

"It wasn't my business to tell," Ginny answered calmly, sitting back in her seat with narrowed eyes.

"You should have told us! I'm your brother, for Merlin's sake."

"It wasn't my business!" Ginny snarled, flaring up for a moment.

"How could this have happened?!" Harry groaned, and Hermione couldn't help but notice that Draco's friends were taking it _much_ easier than hers.

"You were saying, Draco?" Ginny cut in smoothly, her temper under control again. Draco was looking more than a little bit enraged that his wife's friends just expected someone to blab her business, and she wouldn't be surprised if his friends defended him to the death, if necessary. These prats would start a fight over anything; she would rather not be trying to sneak bodies out of the head common room that night.

"The Malfoy family crest only shows itself once a marriage is consummated."

Silence as Draco grinned directly at Ron, wanting to go low enough to rub it into his face; that Ron's extremely desired ex-girlfriend was married to, and had sex with, Draco Malfoy. He didn't have to say anything more than what he had already, though, and Ron was so red that Draco was seriously concerned about the gits blood pressure.

Hermione felt lightheaded again but tried not to show it. She just wanted to get through this stressful conversation and then maybe, _maybe_ , she could eat something substantial.

"Did you even eat anything at breakfast?!" Draco snapped, turning toward her.

Her eyes widened.

"Don't yell at her!"

"Why are you even asking her about breakfast, right now?"

"There are more important things to worry about right now, Draco."

"Answer me!" He yelled, moving closer to her, feeling lightheaded.

"Stay away from her, Death Eater!"

"Don't scream at her like that!"

"No," she answered quietly, looking at Draco through her lashes.

He moved right up to her, taking her hands in his and standing directly in front of her.

"Why not?" he breathed.

Neither even thought at this point to talk in their minds.

"I've just… had a lot going on."

"Hermione, that's bullshit. Why haven't you been eating?"

"Honestly! It's hard to eat when my stomach is constantly twisting with anxiety."

Her eyes were welling up again and Draco had a feeling she was going to lose it.

"You need to eat! You can't fucking starve yourself and think I won't notice at some point. I would prefer to not get dizzy at random intervals when I'm at least taking care of myself."

Instead of answering, she fell forward into him, sobbing, and he instantly wrapped his arms around her. The stress she had been dealing with suddenly broke out of her and she obviously needed to let go. He pulled them to the floor with Hermione sitting on his lap, her arms around his back and her face in the crook of his neck. Draco cradled her in his arms and looked, almost helplessly, at Ginny.

She stifled a laugh.

"I'll go get her something to eat."

Draco nodded and everyone else sat in silence while she cried out her frustrations.

As she was quieting down Harry was looking at Draco curiously.

"How did you know…?"

"She was lightheaded, and it isn't the first time in the last few days."

"But how did you know she was lightheaded?"

"Part of the bond. I feel what she feels. Not as badly of course but we can still feel each other's pain."

"Really?"

"Yeah, it's hard to explain though. It's like I can feel it but I know when it's not my own symptoms."

"Weird."

"You need to eat," Pansy said, moving forward, concern etched on her features, "I know it's hard when you're feeling anxiety but you need to get the nutrients."

"It's seriously just because I'm stressed out. So many things have been going on and I'm scared. I'm so scared."

 _I'm scared for you…_

 _Don't be scared for me, Hermione. We'll figure it out._

 _I don't want you to be killed because of me._

 _It wouldn't be because of you, it would be because of me. And I'm not going to get killed anyway, so get that out of your mind._

Hermione sighed and looked at him.

"What are you going to do, Draco?"

Blaise looked worried, as though he just realized what this bonding could really cause.

Draco moved Hermione from his lap and stood up, knowing there was about to be a major confrontation.

"I know you know, Potter, because Hermione told me what you said to her at breakfast."

"She knows that you're a Death Eater?"

Ron looked to almost be at his limit for bad news.

"I'm a Death Eater, yes, but I am spying for the light."

"You tortured and killed a muggle-born witch three days ago!"

"Yes, I am quite aware of that, thank you."

"How is that spying for the light?!"

"I reported my actions to Dumbledore the morning after my mission. He is well aware of everything that took place. I need to get into the Dark Lord's good graces, I need him to trust me."

"So you had to murder someone?"

"Of course I did!" Draco roared, getting angry.

Blaise and Ron had yet to say anything and Hermione and Pansy were talking amongst themselves behind Draco, still sitting on the floor.

"You don't defy the Dark Lord, Potter, and I wasn't about to get Hermione and myself killed by not following orders."

"How would that even affect Hermione?"

"Were you not listening to me at all? If I die, Hermione dies!"

Harry spluttered for a moment before he suddenly looked at least slightly understanding.

"You love her…"

Draco stopped abruptly and then turned and met Hermione's eyes, "Yes," he said.

Ron stood up suddenly, looking disgusted. He shot a loathing look at Draco before he turned on his heel and stormed out of the room.

Harry had the tact to look embarrassed for him and Ginny just continued by him on her way into the room, not looking even the least bit surprised that he was storming away.

She made a beeline for Hermione, her arms full of food and distracted her by helping her choose what to eat. Pansy reached out and took a chocolate frog from the pile, snacking on it while making sure Hermione didn't eat too much, too fast.

"So you're just going to spy and hope that you don't get caught?"

"I won't let anything happen to Hermione if I can help it, Potter. I'm doing this for her. I want the Dark Lord brought down, badly. If he wins… if he wins, Hermione will die, and I can't allow that. I don't ever want to cause her pain, even though she has, so far, experienced the worst physical pain of her life because of me."

"What do you mean? Worst pain of her life?"

"My father came to visit once he found out about our blood bond…"

Blaise gave Draco a knowing look.

"Let's just say he wasn't happy and took it out on me, and unfortunately that means Hermione too."

Harry looked uncomfortable with hearing that his 'enemy' gets severely punished by his father.

"What happened?"

"Let's just leave it at that. I was punished, she felt the pain. I was punished by the Dark Lord the other night because my Cruciatus Curse wasn't strong enough and she felt that too. I won't allow myself to get caught because if that happens I'll be tortured before they kill me, and she will feel all of that before she dies too. If I get caught… we die. If the Dark Lord wins we die. The only thing I can see myself doing, the only thing I want to do, really, is help you. I know Hermione would be happier if I just stayed out of it all together, but I just can't do that. Especially because I have taken the Mark already and must do what's expected of me."

"I'm not going to lose this war, Malfoy."

Draco didn't say anything, him and Blaise just looked at Harry for a few moments after his exclamation.

"I'm not. It's more than my life on the line here. So many people I care about will be murdered if I don't kill Voldemort. I refuse to lose."

Draco nodded.

"Why did you take the Mark, Malfoy?"

Hermione looked up quickly when she heard Harry ask that.

"I… didn't really have a choice, but I can't blame it only on that. I don't think I fully understood what it meant. I was thinking all glory and didn't consider all of the awful things I would have to do in order to receive any amount of glory, and the glory I would get would all be fake anyway. Who wants glory for murdering innocent people? I was an idiot, but all I can do now is try to rectify my mistakes."

Harry nodded and sat down again and was quickly flanked by Blaise and Draco, seeming much more relaxed while he watched Ginny and Hermione sit on the floor with Pansy Parkinson, eating and chatting happily together, as though they were the best of friends.


	9. Chapter 9

**Chapter 9**

Weeks passed quickly, and Hermione felt some of the tension ease once she realized that her friends weren't going to desert her, well, most of her friends anyway, and they were honestly all trying to get along well. There was, of course, still tension between them and they still argued like cats and dogs, but honestly, it could have been worse.

Ron still hadn't come around.

"Honestly, Potter! Sometimes I think you're thick on purpose!"

"I'm not! It was just a question!"

"A ridiculous question."

Hermione opened her eyes after hearing Pansy and Harry half-heartedly yelling at each other, and she looked over at Draco to see he was still sleeping, his left arm slung over his eyes, his muscled chest rising and falling with his steady breaths.

"Where the bloody hell is Hermione?!"

She held her breath, hearing Ginny ask about her whereabouts made her start to shimmy out of bed, but before she got too far Draco's hand clamped around her wrist. He pulled her back to him and wrapped an arm around her waist, turning her into his body.

"Where do you think you're going?"

"Our friends are downstairs."

"And…?"

Hermione was tucked under Draco's shoulder, their height differences apparent, and he leaned his face down to hers, kissing her passionately.

"Drac… Oh!"

Blaise had thrown open Draco's door just as the kiss was getting good, but luckily they didn't emit the bright flash from kissing anymore, only from coming together now. Hermione and Draco had went out of their way to not mention their possible elemental status to other than his parents and Ginny, who were the only people other than the two professors who were aware of it. They planned to keep it that way until they knew for sure what was going on with it.

"I found Hermione!" Blaise shouted down the stairs toward their friends while Hermione's face flushed a deep red and Draco chuckled.

"Damn it, Zabini! Get out of here!"

"Why, Hermione? Are you embarrassed?"

There were footsteps thundering to the room and Hermione was really wishing she had more than a sheet covering her body.

"Have a good time last night?" Pansy asked, one eyebrow going up, as Harry pushed into the room, gasped, turned bright red and turned his back on the bed immediately.

"Hermione. Jean. Granger. I never would have thought the day would come when I'd catch you in a man's bed…" Ginny was standing with her hands on her hips, a stern look on her joking face and Hermione had never been more mortified in her entire life.

"We're all bored and it's a Hogsmeade weekend, we figured while everyone was out we could all spend some time together, so you should just hop out of that bed and come hang out with us."

Ginny was teasing her and she knew it.

"Yeah, Hermione!" Blaise said enthusiastically, "Just hop out of the bed!"

"Oh, Merlin."

"I'd hop out of bed if you lot would get your sorry arses out of the room so I could!"

"Why do we have to leave?" Blaise asked, ostentatiously checking his fingernails for dirt.

"I'm leaving," Harry said quickly, "I don't want to piss Hermione off, it's scary."

"Thanks a lot, Harry!"

Hermione had the sheet pulled right up to her chin as Draco lounged nonchalantly beside her, grinning at her discomfort.

Draco was not shy of being naked. Apparently around anyone.

"You need to leave, Blaise, because I'm naked under here, and I don't think Draco would be very happy to know that you want to see his wife in such a state…"

That wiped the smirk off both of their faces, neither of them had thought about that but now that Hermione had said it… Draco sat forward quickly, narrowing his eyes at Blaise, who turned abruptly and left the room.

Pansy and Ginny looked at Hermione and laughed before turning away and closing the door softly behind them.

"Real smart, Hermione."

"You could have at least tried to get them out, you have no idea how embarrassing that was for me!"

"I'm just as naked as you are, you know."

"You aren't body shy!"

"You shouldn't be!"

"I… thanks, I think."

"Go get dressed."

"Don't tell me what to do," she said, leaning closer to him and catching his lips in a quick kiss before she laughed and jumped off the bed, pulling the sheet with her.

"Oi! Give me my sheet!"

"I'm taking it with me, I need something to wear across the common room to my bedroom, you dolt."

Hermione wrapped herself up and fled his room quickly before he could reply to her 'dolt' remark. She ran across the common room before anyone could make a comment about her attire and threw on some clothes quickly, not even bothering with a shower at the moment.

She was back in the common room, fully clothed, within a few minutes and was surprised to see Draco in there as well. She was hurrying to the little kitchen in their common room before anyone could engage her in conversation.

"Hermione," Harry started, face still slightly red, but Hermione just whipped her hand up and put it out toward his face, palm facing him.

"I'd wait till she has her first dose of caffeine before you try and talk to her, Potter. Merlin, how do you not know that? Especially after our wakeup call this morning."

Draco beat her to the kitchen and when she entered the room he handed her a mug of tea while he was sipping from a cup of coffee. She smiled appreciatively and took a long pull from the cup. Two sugars. Perfect.

She moved deeper into the kitchen to toast two pieces of bread with her wand, but then noticed that there were already two pieces on a plate.

Draco grinned at her as he buttered them and handed her the small plate, shooing her out of the kitchen. She went to go and then stopped, looking into her mug, which caused him to pluck the cup from her hand and replenish her tea. When he passed it back they smiled softly at each other.

"I think that was the most adorable thing I have ever seen," Ginny said, catching their attention. Pansy, Blaise, Ginny and Harry were all looking into the kitchen.

Blaise was making fake retching noises and Harry just looked slightly horrified.

"Stop it!" Pansy said, turning around and glaring at both boys, "That was beyond cute."

"Yeah…" Harry said, looking like he really wanted to agree with Blaise, but was slightly scared of crossing Pansy.

Hermione felt her cheeks burning, knowing that everyone was watching.

"So has everyone been following their study guides I handed out?" Hermione asked abruptly, hoping to divert the attention from them.

She sat on the couch and bit into her toast.

"I have been, it's really helpful!" Blaise stated, while Harry rolled his eyes and Ginny grinned at the bold-faced lie.

"I haven't, because exams are still ages away," Pansy said seriously, sounding totally unconvinced that Blaise had even looked at his study guide, let alone started to follow it.

"Four months," Hermione corrected, "That's really not far at all. You'll all be grateful for those study guides soon."

"Ron may be coming around. Harry and I have been talking to him in the common room some evenings. We haven't been nagging him, but we've been telling him how much fun everyone has up here when we visit and how these three really aren't that bad."

Hermione nodded, hoping it was true. She really did want her friends to be there. She wanted everyone to, dare she say it? Get along. They had five new allies in the upcoming war, including Draco's parents, and she honestly couldn't find any way to spin it so that it was a bad thing. Throw in the fact that two of the four; Draco and Lucius, were spies and there was really no turning away from that.

They could win this.

Pansy and Blaise weren't death eaters, or really even affiliated with the Dark at all, their families were doing everything in their power to stay neutral, but their children were now officially on the side of the Light. They would never leave Draco to fend for himself. They had pledged their allegiance to him throughout the years with their actions alone, they were the only real friends he had and he would never take that for granted, but they were to follow him and he would never turn them away.

"I hope he does soon, I miss him. I never wanted this to hurt him even though I knew deep down it would. Draco's extremely important to me and I want my friends to like him. Maybe not even like him, but come to terms with the fact that if they want anything to do with me, then that means they must deal with Draco as well."

Hermione was speaking as though she had multiple friends who needed to accept it, but everyone knew that she was speaking about Ron and only Ron. Draco was the most important person to her, which scared her because she almost felt as though she was putting him before her friends, which she supposed was natural, but was it normal for it to happen this fast? Maybe their bond had some weird way of altering their feelings toward one another.

"He'll come around. He'll have to, in the end of it. He loves you and Harry too much to leave you, and he knows if he was to ever actually write you off as a friend that he would most likely lose Harry too. Maybe not as completely, but in a way. It won't happen," Ginny stated wisely.

Hermione nodded and they all sat in silence for a few moments while she looked around at the people she now considered her friends. Close friends. These were the people who immediately accepted what had happened between Hermione and Draco, and she suddenly had an odd feeling bubbling up within her; she hadn't known these people that long, she had known who they were since she was eleven years old, but she didn't really know them. So why did she feel that they belonged? That this is how it was supposed to be?

To her horror, she felt a tingling in the corners of her eyes and her throat was tightening.

What the hell was wrong with her?

She pushed the feelings down, but was very aware of the fact that Draco was watching her closely. Of course he would know how she was feeling at the moment.

"Are you okay?" He asked, looking concerned.

"Yes. I just feel… happy."

Draco's face broke into a grin and Hermione smiled weakly back, looking around and seeing everyone else smiling slightly as well, even though they were probably a little bit weirded out by Draco asking her if she was okay out of the blue again. They would get used to it in time, but Hermione could tell that the connection she shared with Draco sometimes threw everyone off guard, and she knew if she was in the same position she would feel the same way.

Hermione wished Ron was here. Here from the beginning of this, if he decided to come around now he would still be an outsider, he wouldn't be as accepted. Somehow the six friends that were seated in the Head common room defied all odds, and yes they argued, but they also, shockingly, cared for each other. It took them a short amount of time for this to happen and Hermione just knew that Ron had missed his window. It would take him ages to be accepted and involved. This made her sad for him.

Draco sighed.

"I miss flying. I haven't done it enough this year, I've been so busy. I'm not even part of the team."

Harry nodded.

"Me too, Dumbledore suggested I drop Quidditch in order to focus on my new lessons with him, which was probably a good call because they're busy and take a ton of my free time."

"I think it's amazing you're learning about child Voldemort."

"He was even scary as a kid."

Blaise shuddered at the thought.

There was a knock on the door that Ginny went to answer.

"Let's go flying!" Blaise exclaimed, standing from the couch.

"It will help us clear our heads," Harry stated hopefully, staring at Draco, wanting him to agree.

"I bet I could outrace you!" Draco said.

Pansy laughed at him, he sounded like an overexcited child.

Harry snorted, "You wish, Malfoy!" he said jokingly, punching him lightly on the bicep.

"We're Slytherins, we're superior," Blaise exclaimed, jumping from the couch and beating on his chest in a joking matter.

"Okay, Tarzan," Hermione said, smiling.

Harry laughed but no one else in the room understood the reference.

"I'll go grab my broom!"

Draco bounded up the stairs and Hermione couldn't stifle her giggle, he was just so damn cute, so excited to do something as simple as fly.

She then remembered that Ginny had answered the door and turned in her seat to see who had come up to their dorms.

Ron.

And he didn't look impressed to see everyone joking together, at home with each other and completely comfortable.

He cleared his throat and Harry looked over, a grin lighting his features.

"Excellent! Two Gryffindor's and two Slytherin's, this is going to be great!"

Draco came back into the room carrying his broom, still looking excited at the prospect of finally flying again.

"Weasley," he said, in a totally accepting matter.

He didn't want to fight with the boy. He didn't want to ruin the feeling of acceptance and friendship he was finally feeling in his life. He often wondered to himself how his life would have been different if Harry would have accepted his handshake when they were eleven years old, and now he felt like he finally knew. He finally felt happy, and he knew how important it was to Hermione for Ron to be included, and he obviously wanted to keep his wife happy.

He pulled Hermione from the couch and gave her a loving kiss, happier than he could remember feeling, ever, and grinned even more when Ron averted his gaze.

"We'll be back later, you girls have fun!"

He turned around, clapping Harry on the back as the group of four made their way to the portrait hole.

Hermione turned to Ginny and Pansy, eyes wide.

"It feels wonderful, doesn't it?" Pansy asked, smiling.

/

Hermione's giddy attitude was short lived.

A couple hours after the boys had left their common room, the three girls were lounging on the couches, gossiping about other students; something Hermione secretly revelled in. She never had another girlfriend other than Ginny so she really enjoyed these moments.

"And, to top it all off, she told Professor Snape to get his huge nose out of her face and to stop getting his greasy locks on her parchment."

Hermione laughed and Ginny looked appalled.

"Needless to say she has detention for the rest of the year. Who said Hufflepuffs were peaceful? I think she missed the memo. Do you think maybe she has been doing… extracurricular potions?" Pansy asked, her right eyebrow ascending.

Hermione laughed harder, Pansy really was hilarious.

Her laughter quickly cut itself off as a moan of pain pushed from her lungs, she gripped her left arm, right where her Malfoy family crest was, pain lancing through her arm.

"Hermione?" Pansy moved closer, looking down.

"Oh no," Ginny said.

Hermione nodded. "He's being summoned," she said sadly, looking her friends in the eye.

"We're staying here tonight, Hermione," Ginny started as Pansy nodded vigorously, "I don't feel comfortable leaving you alone while he's out there."

Hermione nodded, still in shock about the pain in her arm. She had felt it many times over the last few months but it never changed the pain, and she would never get used to it. She really didn't want to be alone while he was at the meeting, every time he went she felt so alone and helpless, maybe having her friends around would help.

"I'm going to get some pajamas and my night time things," Ginny said. She seemed to be in a hurry and Hermione had to wonder if she was going to attempt to get to Gryffindor tower and back before Draco had to leave. Pansy again nodded her agreement and the two stood up and fled the room quickly.

Hermione tidied up the common room and then went to her room to put on her pajamas. She was exceptionally grateful for Pansy and Ginny at this moment. Anything that could help her keep her mind off whatever Draco was having to endure while in the presence of Voldemort she would take.

It wasn't late, probably just after dinner, but she wanted the comfort of her pajamas. The comfort of her friends. She made it back to the common room just as the portrait opened and to her complete surprise all six of her friends were filing in, Ron included.

Hermione ran to Draco, scared.

She didn't think she would ever be unafraid when he was leaving her to go to these meetings. She had no idea what to expect.

"It'll be fine."

"I know," Hermione whispered.

They had no way of knowing this, of course, but it made her feel better.

"Everyone is staying here with you until I get back."

"Everyone?"

"Come with me while I change."

Draco took her hand gently and she followed him to his bedroom.

"Why is everyone staying?"

"You need the distraction."

"I know but I also… are you sure you want everyone here when you get back? What if you have to do something awful?"

"It'll be alright, I really don't have any secrets from them anyway. I have to report everything to Dumbledore and Harry is usually with me for that. The Order would know all of the proceedings, I'd tell Blaise and Pansy regardless of what happened, and I'm sure Harry would also tell Ginny. Maybe Weasley wouldn't know, but he'd be the only one."

Hermione nodded, watching him pull off his casual wear and throw on his black Death Eater robes. The mark on his arm was now a dark black instead of red and Hermione couldn't take her eyes off of it. Once his robe sleeve covered his arm she looked back into his face, he looked defeated. She knew he didn't exactly want to attend the meetings, knowing there was a very high probability that he would be harmed, ensuring Hermione's pain as well, but he did what he had to.

He picked up his mask and she followed him down the stairs back to the common room where their friends were sitting.

Draco pulled her to his chest, hugging her hard for a moment and kissing her on the lips lightly, and again, pulled her left arm to his mouth, kissing the family crest; something he did before he left for every meeting he had been summoned to.

"I'll be back later," He said to the room at large, before pulling his mask on. Ron averted his eyes when he saw the mask making its way to Draco's face. Hermione watched Draco's eyes become distant and cold behind his mask, knowing he was putting on more than one mask at the moment, before he turned and entered the fireplace.

Heading home once more.

/

The friends sat in an awkward silence for a few minutes, worried for Draco.

All but one anyway.

After a few minutes Pansy and Blaise started an absurd conversation about unlikely couples in the school. Who would be hilarious together, and who would be shocking together. Ginny finally laughed and pointed out that Hermione and Draco were probably the most unlikely couple in the entire wizarding world, and not just school. After that conversation flowed easily, but there was still an underlying tension in the air.

"Who wants a drink?" Hermione asked after some time, taking orders from her friends before heading to the kitchen.

"I'll help you," Ron said, standing up quickly and following her to the kitchen.

Harry and Ginny shared an uneasy look but allowed Ron to go alone, maybe it was good if they talked privately for a few minutes.

Ron stood awkwardly in the kitchen, waiting for Hermione to say something. What she did end up saying was not something he expected, or wanted, to hear.

"I'm worried."

She said it quietly, as though she didn't want anyone else to hear her words.

Her words sent Ron's blood boiling. It was irrational of him, he knew, but he was unable to control it. Hermione was supposed to be his, they were supposed to have a second chance at their relationship.

"You're worried? About Malfoy? Hermione, come on, this is all ridiculous."

She looked at him, confused. She was under the impression that he had finally come to terms with everything and understood what was going on.

He was turning red, dark red, which was never a good sign.

"Ron…"

She wasn't even sure what she could say to him at this point, she was utterly confused.

He was in her face suddenly, pushing her back against the counter as his leg worked its way in between her thighs, and before she could even react to his close proximity his lips were on hers, pushing his tongue into her mouth while her lips burned and it felt as though an electrical current was pulsing through her face.

The blood bond. Was Draco feeling this?!

She pushed him away fiercely and he stumbled away from her.

"What are you doing?!" she shrieked, "are you out of your bloody mind!?"

"I was kissing you! You know that we belong together!"

The kitchen was full as Hermione's friends burst their way in, Pansy and Ginny flanking Hermione immediately.

She was livid.

"You better hope, right now, that Draco didn't feel that because if you just gave him away I will… UGH! Ron! If he felt that, you will have hell to pay!"

Hermione couldn't even express the way she was feeling. For once in her life, words were failing her. Harry looked mutinous and pulled Ron from the kitchen and forced him into an armchair. Ron was spluttering and angry, angry at being rejected and angry that it seemed as though Harry was taking Malfoy's side in this.

"What were you thinking?!" Harry hissed at him, "You know that no matter what, it's her and Draco. Nothing you can do will change that, ever."

Hermione was crying now, fear for Draco tightening her chest and making it difficult to breathe. Pansy and Ginny sat her on the couch and sat on either side of her, both of their arms wrapped around her and they sat that way.

"If Draco is caught because of your antics, Weasley, you will be answering to me."

Blaise wasn't threatening very often, but these words, coupled with the look on his face, were frightening.

"You know they have a blood bond!" Ginny almost screamed, "You know that she can't be with another person without both of them feeling pain, because I have told you about it more than once! You're such an idiot!" Ginny was fiery, but her anger seemed to calm Hermione down slightly.

"It didn't hurt her!" Ron yelled indignantly.

"It did, Ron."

Hermione spoke so quietly and calmly that you never would have known she was hysterical mere minutes ago.

"When either of us goes against the bond, even as much as kissing, it feels like I'm being electrocuted. If I feel it, Draco does too."

Ron tried to stand to leave, but Harry wasn't having it. He pushed him back down into his seat, angrier than Hermione could ever recall seeing him.

"If you have given Draco away, I will never forgive you."

"Oh, you're so concerned about ferret face, you don't give a shit about me anymore? He's so important to you." Ron was whining and he knew it, but at this point he didn't care.

"I am concerned about Draco, yes, but I am also extremely concerned about Hermione. You know? The girl I consider my sister?! If something happens to Draco, something happens to her, and if something happens to either of them you are worse off than even Voldemort."

Harry was standing above Ron, towering over him actually, his green eyes were blazing and Pansy and Blaise shared a look. They were suddenly very aware that Harry was probably the right choice for someone under the age of 18 to defeat Voldemort. His aura was menacing and scary.

At that moment, Hermione went rigid in Pansy and Ginny's arms. Her body started to convulse, and millions of knives were on her, slicing her and tearing her apart. Her bones felt as though they were snapping. Pansy started screaming and Ginny was in tears, blood started to trickle out of Hermione's mouth and nose. The curse was lasting much too long, her body wasn't able to endure the pain and for some reason all she could think of were the most horrible thoughts. Almost like there were Dementors crawling through her mind, dragging at her brain with their rattling breath, causing her to ice up from the inside out.

Finally the curse stopped, but it wasn't a sudden end, it was slow, the pain subsided in an almost casual manner, and her fear for Draco over took her. Harry was holding her in his arms, lifting her from the floor that she had slipped onto and he placed her in an armchair. He was wiping at the blood on her face with his sleeve and couldn't help but feel like this was all Ron's fault. He felt disgusted with him.

Hermione had silent tears running down her cheeks and Pansy came to Hermione with her own salty tracks on her face and pressed a steaming mug of tea into her hands.

"Calm down. It will be fine."

Her words would have been a lot more reassuring if she hadn't been crying.

Hermione tried to gather her wits, but she still felt cold on the inside, she still had awful images flashing through her mind and she really and truly just wanted Draco to come through the door. She wanted him with her now. She dropped her tea onto the rug and cried out in pain as it felt as though her body was sliced open in numerous areas at once.

Hermione hugged her knees to her chest as Harry picked up her mug and took it to the kitchen before returning to Hermione and sitting on the floor in front of her armchair. No one asked any questions but everyone looked incredibly concerned.

Blaise looked torn between standing guard over the idiot Weasley boy and approaching Hermione. He compromised by standing in the middle of the room, looking from one to the other.

Pansy sat back beside Ginny and all was silent except for the occasional sniffling from the girls in the room. Ron looked incredibly guilty and no one felt even a shard of pity toward him, Ginny, in fact, kept glaring at him from her tear filled eyes.

No one took a stab at conversation anymore, everyone was much too worried about Draco. Hermione let out an occasional whimper by accident and felt as though she was getting weaker with each passing minute but she didn't want to worry her friends even more than they already were, so she kept her mouth shut.

They sat and waited for what felt like many hours, but in all reality was only about one. Ginny and Pansy started to doze on the couch and Hermione had been staring at the fire for ever, lost in her own tormented mind. Harry was sitting on the floor at her feet and Blaise was sleeping on the floor on his stomach.

The door to the common room suddenly opened and Hermione jumped up, stepping on Harry's hand as she moved forward.

Draco stumbled forward, looking as though his legs weren't working properly and the first thing his eyes fell on was Hermione. He rushed to her as best as he could, pulling her close to his body and she started sobbing in his arms, almost hysterically. Draco felt slightly damp and Hermione wondered vaguely if it was raining outside.

 _I was so worried. So scared._

 _What the hell happened?_

 _He kissed me. What happened with you? Did he find anything out?!_

 _Who kissed you?_

Hermione didn't answer immediately and Draco's attention was drawn to everyone in the room. The girls and Blaise were awake now, looking incredibly happy to see him walking and talking. Harry was up and patting him on the back with a look on his face that Draco couldn't place.

"Who kissed my wife?!"

Ron snorted, drawing attention to himself. Hermione pulled out of Draco's arms and looked around the room. Pansy and Ginny were glaring at Ron but Blaise was looking at Hermione and Draco with wide eyes. Harry was standing slightly behind Draco and couldn't see what Blaise was looking at.

"Oh, I should have known. Who do you think you are?!"

"Are you kidding?! Who do I think I am?! You stole her from me! Right from under my nose."

"I'm not having this conversation," Draco said, pulling the mask from his face and flinging it aside, flinching slightly at the movement.

"She was supposed to be with me," Ron said, gloomily.

"Well, she's not. She never will be. Don't even _think_ about touching her ever again."

"Did it give you away?" Harry asked, moving to stand near Ginny, but when he turned around his eyes went as wide as Blaise's had been, gaping at the couple.

"It would have if I wasn't so good at occlumency. I dropped something that is apparently important when it felt like my face was being cursed off and He was not pleased," Draco said, oblivious to the looks he was receiving.

Hermione snuggled deeper into his chest and his arms tightened around her.

"Please tell me that you're okay."

"I'm okay," she snuffled.

"You're a liar."

Ron was watching their display of affection in complete disgust.

"Draco! What happened?!" Harry and Blaise snapped out of their reverie and moved forward together to gently pull Hermione away from him. She looked down at Draco's body and didn't understand; then she looked at herself and saw that the front of her chest and stomach was bloody.

Oh Merlin!

"I was punished. I told you that already."

"Take your robes off, Draco!" Pansy was sobbing now that she caught sight of Hermione, and everything was clicking into place.

Draco slowly removed his outer robes and Harry helped him pull his t-shirt over his head.

Pansy started to cry harder and Ginny began whimpering. Hermione was basically dazed, but she removed her wand from her pocket and moved to Draco, whispering "Tergeo", and the blood was siphoned from his body slowly, revealing his wounds. Long gashes crossed his body, almost as though someone had taken a large sword and sliced him up strategically.

"Draco…"

"Oh my goodness!"

"Come sit down."

"Let me get you a coffee."

Hermione watched Harry and Blaise move Draco to the couch while Ginny ran into the kitchen to get a drink, apparently that was her "go to" because her first instinct seemed to be getting someone something from a kitchen. Hermione watched all of this in slow motion and then turned to Ron, disbelief marring her features, this was all his fault!

She broke her gaze from his and ran to Draco's side.

"Please tell me that you're okay! I can't believe this happened, I'm so sorry. This is all my fault!"

Tears were falling from Hermione's eyes and landing on Draco's lap, she was on her knees in front of him, clasping his hands and sobbing hard. "All my fault!" She said again between sobs.

Ron watched on and jealousy engulfed him.

"I can't do this." He stated, standing from his armchair.

"Then leave!" Draco yelled suddenly, his face contorted in rage, "I tried to give you a chance earlier today, Weasley, against my better judgement and I'm regretting that more than I have ever regretted anything in my life. You don't even care that you put one of your best friends, my wife, who I am out there risking my life for _every day_ , at serious risk tonight! You disgust me, and I never want to have the unfortunate luck to see your filthy face again! Get out! "

Ron looked as though he was going to attack Draco, lunge at him, but Harry stood up and stood in between them, "I think you should just go."

"I would have been gone hours ago if you lot didn't make me stay!"

"We needed to make sure that Draco came back safe. Now that he's returned to us alive, at least, I think you should leave."

Ron gave everyone in the room a scathing look and turned on his heel, marching from the room with all of his dignity gone.

Ginny rushed from the kitchen with a mug of coffee and put it on the table in front of Draco and then took Hermione by an arm and assisted her to her feet.

"None of this was your fault," Pansy said, moving forward and pulling Hermione into a tight hug.

They all stood and watched as Blaise healed Draco's wounds expertly. He said he had been studying and practicing healing charms because of the war, and even though Hermione had been learning them ever since her and Draco's incident all those months ago, she was not in any state to do the job.


	10. Chapter 10

**Chapter 10**

The students studied hard for their upcoming NEWTs and Draco and Hermione were managing to juggle their Head duties impeccably, on top of everything else. Draco continuously went to meetings and he always came back looking sad and lost, at least until he was back with Hermione, then he felt whole again. He felt like his life had a purpose again.

Hermione and Draco also managed to find time to work on their elemental powers, something that their friends found to be incredibly cool when the couple finally confided in them. They studied them as well as they could, but they were unable to find a lot of books about it in the school library. They were finally able to control the powers they possessed, they could reign them in and flare them out on command and Dumbledore was incredibly happy with them. During their last private practice session, in a closed classroom that Dumbledore had allowed them to use, Draco had made it hail huge balls of ice, he could manage to direct them, make them hit certain objects and targets. Hermione was beyond proud of him. She was able to make flames appear out of nowhere, catching specific objects on fire with ease. She also learned, as her powers progressed, that she was able to control heat without any sort of flame being present. She could probably make a person boil from the inside if she had to. The same went for Draco, just opposite, he could freeze the air, or, if need be, a person. They also didn't need as much recuperation time now, even a quick kiss was able to sustain their power and energy for a few hours.

Harry, Ginny, Pansy and Blaise spent a lot of time in the classroom with the two, practicing their dueling and learning new, advanced spells. They were also getting extremely good at transfiguration and were able to change objects, themselves, and each other's appearances easily. They may not have had elemental power to back them up but they were still incredibly strong, and training together caused them to be able to foresee each other's actions. The students would be a force to reckon with when the time came.

Hermione and Draco were able to block out most of the pain shared between them now, which was the fruit of many hours of labour. It took weeks for them to learn, enduring a ridiculous amount of pain to get there, Draco could undergo the cruciatus curse and Hermione was able to shut it out at the first hint of pain. They had to turn off the pain receptor in their brains when it was happening, which took a lot of focus and sometimes left each of them in a detached state, but it was better than feeling each other's pain so acutely.

It was for the best.

The six friends were as close as they could be, and they all still managed to keep the relationships forming between them all a secret from the rest of the school. The bickering stopped, the sarcasm toward each other didn't; but that was probably how things would always be between the two once opposing groups of friends. Hermione's runes and her Malfoy family crest were never seen by anyone else, although as the weather got warmer she had plenty of people ask her why she was continuing to wear long sleeve shirts.

Ron hadn't come around and Hermione was sad about it in a way, but also kind of glad. After what he did and what he had caused without even considering his actions… that was unforgivable. He could have got both her and Draco killed, she couldn't accept and forget that. Harry and Ginny still spoke to him, of course, but they never spoke of him around their new group of friends.

Before Hermione even knew it, June was upon them, right along with NEWTs and graduation.

"What are we going to do after school?"

Hermione posed the question to Draco one night while sitting in the common room. It was something she found that she was thinking about constantly, which was a hindrance to her exams that she was studying for in every spare waking moment.

"Would you like to be more specific?"

"With everything, really…"

"Well, we are going to find a place to live, wait for our NEWT results so that we can apply for jobs, and then go from there."

"And we are going to live together?"

"Of course we're going to live together, why wouldn't we?"

Draco was looking at her like she was mad.

"Oh, I don't know. Maybe the fact that you're a Death Eater and I'm a muggleborn?"

"You're still my wife," Draco growled this, suddenly annoyed.

"How will the charade continue, Draco?"

"We will get a secret keeper."

Hermione was surprised with herself, how had she not thought about that?

"Right."

Draco was grinning at her, but he didn't make a comment about her slip up.

"Do you think it's going to come to a close after school is out?"

"Well we know that the Dark Lord is waiting for Harry to be out of school, it only makes sense that he would want to wait until Dumbledore is out of the picture before he attacks him."

"I don't know what's going to happen." Hermione sighed and shifted on the couch, "All I know is that I want all of us to survive."

"We will."

"I hope so… Maybe we should all live together, at least until the war is over."

Draco gave Hermione a look.

"Seriously, Draco! Think about it, we aren't as strong without all of us there, and Harry and Blaise could kick some serious arse when they're together. Obviously with us as well, but even though they don't have the power that we possess, they're still amazingly strong. We know each other's tactics, and Ginny and Pansy are just brilliant together too. What if Pansy was living in a flat alone and something happened? She's strong, but she's much stronger with all of us around to give her confidence and assistance. What if something happened to Harry or Blaise while they were alone…? Or Ginny? I don't think I could live with myself. Between the six of us we could get a decent sized place so we would all still have privacy, but we would all have the comfort of having the others around. And since Ginny and Harry are together, and so are Blaise and Pansy… it would just be like having the best roommates imaginable."

"You've put a lot of thought into this," Draco said, smirking slightly.

"I have."

"I like it."

"Really?!"

"We'll talk to them after our practice tonight, which we should probably get to."

He took Hermione's hand and pulled her up from the couch.

"You're brilliant, you know?"

"I know," she said cheekily, grinning at him.

They made it to the empty classroom where their practices were held to find Dumbledore there speaking with Harry and Ginny, who were both wearing large smiles.

"What's going on, professor?" Hermione asked.

"We have decided to move your practice to the quidditch pitch, this evening."

"But won't students be able to see us?"

"That has been taken care of. Enchantments have been put on it to keep what is happening inside the pitch secret. I have also had it arranged so that there is an obstacle course, of sorts, set up inside."

"That sounds brilliant!"

Draco was excited to get out of the same old classroom and do something a little bit different for the first time, and Hermione couldn't blame him.

Once Pansy and Blaise arrived Dumbledore led all of the students out of the castle and down the sloping grounds to the pitch. They passed no other students in the halls, which Hermione found strange.

 _Where is everyone?_

 _I was just wondering the same thing. Dinner hasn't been over long, there's no reason for the halls to be this empty._

 _It's almost… eerie._

 _Dumbledore seems happy, maybe he just had it arranged for the other students to be out of our way for the evening._

 _He is a cunning man, who knows?_

They stopped their conversation as they approached the entrance to the pitch. It was dusk, not quite dark, but not light outside either, which added to the strange atmosphere that Hermione felt since they left the classroom upstairs. She gripped her wand, feeling more comfortable now that it was in her hand and saw Draco and Pansy pull theirs out as well. Harry looked at them curiously before he pulled his out and Ginny and Blaise followed suit. For some reason they were all on edge.

"After you," Dumbledore said, a twinkle in his eye.

The students entered the pitch and all hell broke loose. Black cloaked figures were all over the place and the six friends fell into their training almost instantly.

Blaise rolled before he stopped and threw an inpendimenta jinx at a figure that was advancing on Ginny. She glanced at him and thrust her wand toward the same person, stunning them swiftly. Hermione dashed to the right, hiding behind a large object momentarily and then peeking around it, throwing a well-aimed blast of fire from her hands at a figure that was running at her. The person tripped and fell moments before being singed by the fire and she fired off a quick stunning hex at him, now sprawled on the ground. A stinging hex caught her on the arm and she hissed in pain before sprinting to a different covered area, as soon as she moved the place she was standing seconds before absorbed a stunner.

Draco was shooting icicle like object from his hands, but was frustrated as they seemed to be absorbed by the person before him, instead of hurting them. He suddenly went to his knees, slamming his hands into the ground and stalagmites made of thick ice shot up, forming a cage around the person. They shrieked in frustration and tried to melt their way out quickly, but the bars of their cage were so thick it would take a while. He gripped his wand again and took off running, trying to find Hermione and Harry, the two people that he had deemed as most important in any type of attack.

Harry was surrounded by stunned figures and looked gleeful, almost like this was the most fun he's had in a while and obviously didn't need his help. Pansy and Ginny were cornering three other figures and as Draco watched all of them fell to the ground, stunned. Blaise was walking around slowly, trying to find more attackers, glad that he was able to take out a few while assisting Harry, and Hermione was whipping an almost tornado like plume of heat around the last attacker, who seemed to be immune to her attack. She was getting more and more frustrated and dropped her hands, whipping out her wand and stupefying the person before they even realized the heat tornado had ended.

Silence, as all six friends looked at each other with wide grins.

Clapping suddenly started reverberating around the pitch and they spun around to see Dumbledore approaching.

"Good job! I'm very impressed."

"Sir…?"

"These kind, black robed people, are actually your teachers and other staff from the school. We decided to test you all to make sure you could handle yourselves, and you all did a wonderful job. Hermione, Draco, your elemental powers weren't working _only_ because we didn't want you to be able to actually harm them. The staff are all wearing a special cloak that I recently designed in order to ward off your elemental power. I am going to be taking them back and storing them safely, so don't worry about your powers being useless in any other type of situation. If you were in an actual battle you both would have done some major damage! Let's go wake up the staff, yes?"

The students split up and walked around, muttering "Ennervate" every so often.

"Draco! This ice cage is magnificent! How did you even think to do this?"

The students and staff of Hogwarts approached the cage, which held the only teacher who didn't get stunned, and the only teacher still trapped; the rest were awake now.

"I was trying to attack with my power and it wasn't working, so I was getting frustrated. I thought maybe this person had some special magic that was able to deter my power, so I thought if I caged him we could check him out after."

The person in the cage pulled down his hood, and Snape stared out. He wasn't amused.

"I can't melt these bloody bars, they're too thick."

"I'll get you out, professor," Hermione said, rushing forward and heating the area with her power so the bars melted in mere moments.

"Amazing," Professor Flitwick muttered from beside them.

Now that everyone was awake and free, the students began to feel slightly awkward; they had just took out the entire staff of Hogwarts in less than ten minutes. Something Dumbledore didn't waste any time pointing out. The six friends blushed but were very proud of their accomplishments.

"That was so much fun."

"Hopefully it will be that easy during the war!"

"Whenever that happens."

"I wish we could do this more often. It was so nice to actually use our powers in a threatening situation."

"Let's live together!"

"Draco…"

"What!? Who do you want to live together?"

Hermione sighed. Draco really needed to learn when and how to bring things up without looking and acting like a crazy person.

"We were discussing it earlier, and we thought it would be brilliant if we all found a place together after graduation. With all six of us, it shouldn't be hard to afford a place big enough for all of us to live comfortably, and I don't know about you guys but I don't really want to be separated after school."

"I think it's a great idea!"

"We could have so much fun."

"I don't graduate this year, though."

Ginny sounded exceptionally sad about this.

"So live with us until you have to go back to school."

"Really?"

"Of course. And you could come back on holidays and everything. It would be your home, at least until after the war. I don't want to be away from you guys until we know everything is safe again. Look at what we did back there! We seriously rocked that."

"Let's do it."

Harry, though, seemed slightly reluctant.

"What's up with you, Harry?" Ginny asked, squeezing his hand.

"It's not that I don't think it's a good idea, it would be fun and we would all be safe, but what about Ron? He would feel so left out and abandoned."

"Let's worry about that when the time comes. If he can manage to not be an arse for five seconds than maybe he wouldn't even be in this situation in the first place."

Hermione couldn't help but agree and she noticed that there were students around again. Dumbledore had obviously arranged something so that they were busy before. Draco seemed to notice as well, he gave Pansy and Blaise a significant look and the three filtered away from Harry, Ginny and Hermione.

 _See you later, love._

Hermione smiled to herself and turned to Harry to continue talking about the Ron situation, but she was confronted by a group of sixth year Ravenclaw girls.

"Er… Hello."

"Hermione Granger! We heard a rumour that you have tattoos that you got in the muggle world and we were hoping we could see them."

"Who told you that?" Ginny said fiercely, stepping in between Hermione and the group of tattoo-fans.

"He said you have three!"

"He said two!"

"Well it's technically three, because he said the one on her stomach has a smaller one beneath it!"

"Who is he?" Ginny asked loudly again as Hermione's stomach started to feel uncomfortable.

"Please let us see!"

"I would rather not bare my midriff in the middle of the lawns," Hermione said, slightly stiffly, as the girls all had crestfallen looks.

"So it's true then?! That is so cool!"

Hermione had never been referred to as 'cool' and she blushed slightly.

"Who told you that?" Harry asked in his deep tones, stepping closer. All the girls began twittering about the fact that Harry Potter was speaking to them, most of them looking at him in awe.

"Ron Weasley, of course."

Rage filled Hermione's senses. Was he trying to get her and Draco caught?

Hermione's eyes met with Harry's and she saw the rage reflected back at her before he turned and marched away angrily.

"Oh, Merlin," Ginny mumbled before facing the group of girls again, who all looked bewildered at Harry's sudden, angry, departure. "Sorry, ladies, but we have some things to attend to," she said, before taking Hermione's hand and pulling her away.

"What is he playing at?" Hermione asked angrily, fuming, "Is he trying to call attention to our relationship?! If anyone who is pure-blooded saw this mark," she gestured to her arm, "they would instantly know what it was. Pansy, Ron and Blaise knew the moment they laid eyes on it. I have _neve_ r been so angry with your brother, this even tops getting me and Draco tortured! It's been _months_ , why hasn't he given it up already?!"

Ginny hummed in sympathy but didn't say a word as they entered the castle and tried to track down Harry.

 _Ron is telling people about my markings!_

 _Are you serious?_

 _Yes! I was just approached by a bunch of Ravenclaws who wanted to see my 'muggle tattoos' that Ron told them about._

 _I will kill that ginger, I swear._

 _Harry's gone to find him at the moment._

 _I'm going to look._

 _See you soon._

"Draco is not impressed."

"How does… oh never mind."

The girls approached the Gryffindor tower and Ginny made the decision to sneak into Harry's room and borrow his map. She hurdled back out of the portrait and led Hermione to a deserted lavatory to check the map, and after perusing it for a few moments she jabbed her finger at a bathroom closer to the head dorms than they were, and there was Harry and Ron, with Draco striding quickly down the corridor.

"Let's go," Hermione said, running in the direction of the bathroom. Once they were closer they could hear raised voices and Ginny grabbed her hand, stopping her and putting her finger to her lips.

"I'm not going to eavesdrop, Ginny."

"That's Harry yelling, he might be embarrassed if we just charge in there."

"He will be even more embarrassed to find out we are out here listening."

Ginny hushed her as Harry's voice rose.

"Have you completely lost your mind?! I don't know why you're out to get Hermione, Ron, but if people found out about this do you honestly think they would just let it lay?"

"I'm not out to get Hermione; I'm out to get this ferret."

Harry almost screamed in frustration.

"How many times do you have to be told this before it gets through your thick skull?! If something happens to Draco, something happens to Hermione! I won't let you ruin her life."

"I'm ruining her life?! What about this git?! He has her and doesn't even care about her!"

"Why would you assume that I don't care about her, Weasel?" Draco asked in a tone that signalled to Hermione he was just about to lose his self-control.

"Oh, please. She's a muggle-born. She's beneath you, less than the dirt you walk on. She's a know-it-all bookworm that could never make a man happy. Isn't that what you have been drilling into her head since we were eleven?!"

"It's different now," he said quietly, and Hermione strained her ears as she moved closer to the bathroom. "I don't believe any of those things. I have learned so much about her since September, don't you realize that? Do you think we just sit in silence in our common room constantly? We spend that time getting to know each other, and let me tell you right now, I love that girl more than anyone will probably ever realize, and if anyone does anything to hurt her, they will answer to me! You've done something incredibly stupid, again, Weasley, and if anything happens to her because of this you'll have to deal with me!"

"And me!" Harry yelled, "Now get out of my sight before I do something I'll regret."

The girls heard silence for a few moments before the door was thrust open and Ron stood before them, red in the face.

"I'm sorry, Hermione."

"Why did you do it, Ron?"

"I'm just… I don't know. I'm confused. I really didn't want you to be hurt by any of the things I said."

"Just please don't say anything else about my life to anyone. Anything."

Ron nodded and seemed to realize by Hermione's tone that he should just walk away, which he did, cursing silently under his breath.

"I can't wait to get out of this damn school," Draco said, coming out of the bathroom with an agreeing Harry behind him. "I'm sorry you had to hear that, girls."

Hermione smiled and entered Draco's embrace, happy that he would stick up for her, but hearing his admission of love was what was making her grin stupidly. They knew that each of them loved each other, but they weren't that couple that said it to each other on a regular basis. Harry was slightly red because he realized Hermione had heard Draco's words, but he was happy. Harry knew for sure now that Draco wouldn't let anything bad happen to her; he truly loved her. Harry didn't think Draco was even considering his own life when he worried about Hermione's; he was only worried about her safety and well-being.

"Well, I guess the living together question has been answered, I'll look at places with you guys as soon as we are out of this damn school. I don't even want Ron in my sight right now, and I'm not sure anything will change that. I'm sorry, Ginny, but his blatant disregard for Hermione's safety is disturbing to me. He is so hotheaded and blind to what he is doing, he's a liability and I can't have it."

"I understand, Harry. I'm worried about him though, you know when he feels out casted he goes off the deep end, when he feels left out… well just look at your fourth year. He didn't talk to you for months because of something out of your control."

"He didn't talk to me, but he didn't go out of his way to harm me."

"Well I think Hermione's marriage is a bigger blow than you getting a little more attention than him."

"I don't think he will say anything more, Ginny."

Ginny just shrugged her shoulders and smiled at them, "Let's go to your common room, yeah? Better than standing in the middle of the castle all evening.


	11. Chapter 11

**A/N- I just want to thank everyone who has favourited/followed/reviewed! It really means a lot to me, and I should just let everyone know this story is winding down - this is the second last chapter. Thanks so much for all of the love!**

 **Chapter 11**

NEWTs were two days away.

Hermione was freaking out.

She had all of her textbooks and large stacks of parchment from each class piled around her on the common room floor.

"Come on, Hermione, I know you already know all of that. Just relax!"

"Relax? Relax?! These exams will determine our entire futures! And I'm going to fail everything, I just know it!"

Draco looked at her, bewildered, from the couch but Harry just laughed. Draco had never had to experience a Hermione Granger, end of term, exam freak out before; this was his one, and thankfully only, experience.

"You aren't going to fail, Hermione. You're brilliant and will do just fine. If I recall, you got all O's on your OWLs."

"These aren't OWLs, Harry! They are so much harder and so much more important than the stupid OWLs."

"You got all O's? Impressive!" Blaise and Pansy had also never seen such a sight, and had no idea whatsoever that Hermione had received the highest marks possible on all of her exams. Pansy found she wasn't surprised though.

"I find that I can't study the last few days before exams. I soak it all in all year long, I study for weeks prior, but the few days before it's like I can't shove any more information into my brain. I either know it or I don't, stressing myself out won't help," Pansy said to the room at large.

"Bully for you," Hermione ground out from behind a pile of History of Magic notes.

Draco laughed and Hermione didn't look the least bit offended.

/

Hermione breathed a sigh of relief as she walked out of her last NEWT exam, charms. She had done well she thought, and only had to wait an agonizing six weeks for her exam results. It was almost bittersweet that the exams were over; she was glad to have the stress off her back and excited to go look at houses with her friends, but leaving Hogwarts castle for the last time would be hard. She would still see a couple of her professor's at Order meetings, but she wouldn't see them all and wouldn't see the majority of them ever again after she left here.

Draco was ecstatic. He knew he had done well on his exams, without having daily breakdowns about them like Hermione did, and would enjoy his last six weeks waiting for exam results before he had to get serious about looking for a job. He couldn't wait to get out this hell hole and start his life with his wife and new friends. He was apprehensive about the upcoming war, but who wouldn't be? He would just have to make the best of it until it occurred, he had his wife's support, his parents and also his best friends. What more could a bloke really ask for? He could always ask that he could love his wife openly, without fear of retribution from the people he was associated with, but he knew that wasn't going to happen until this war ended, so until then he would be content with what he had.

The six friends had arranged with Dumbledore to be their secret keeper once they found a place. All they had to do was contact him once they picked a suitable house and he would come and perform the necessary charms. They weren't taking the train home, none of them, it seemed too dangerous and like a perfect target area for Harry to be abducted or attacked, so they were apparating to the only safe house they knew of – Grimmauld place. Harry, Ginny, and Hermione each took one of the Slytherins in side-along apparition since they wouldn't be able to apparate in themselves.

"Where are we?"

"Wait a minute…" Draco started, "This house is extremely familiar. This is the house of the Black Family, isn't it?"

"Yes, Sirius left it to Harry when he died."

Draco just nodded as Pansy inspected the umbrella stand made from a severed troll's leg. Blaise and Ginny wandered into the sitting area and sat on couches, and Blaise pulled out a newspaper to start inspecting houses.

"Quick question," He said to the room at large, "Are we buying or renting? That's going to make a difference in availability."

No one said anything for a few moments, "Renting, I guess," Harry said, after he had eye contact with Ginny for a while.

"I absolutely hate the idea of renting a house," Draco said, "Actually, don't make any decisions right now. I need to speak with my father quickly." He approached his trunk that he dropped at the doorway and pulled out his death eater robes and mask. "Just in case," he said, flashing a grin to Ginny, who was looking at him curiously.

"I'll be back in a while, okay, love?"

"What are you doing?"

"I'm going to talk to my father about withdrawing some of my trust."

"Why are you taking your robes?" Hermione was confused and they were speaking in hushed voices.

"The Dark Lord is surely still using Malfoy Manor as his own personal lair, so I would rather be prepared in case he needs me instead of having to come back here and possibly alert people where I am going."

"You think of it all."

Draco pulled her in for a passionate kiss before he broke away to apparate to his father's home.

"I love you."

"I love you too, Draco."

The group made their way to the kitchen to inspect it for salvageable food, finding nothing. Instead they sat around the wooden table, thinking about what their house would be like, joking about all the fun they would have in the near future – desperately avoiding the topic of war.

To Hermione's relief, Draco arrived a few hours after he left and he looked incredibly happy.

"New plan. I'm going to buy a place, we will all live there until the time is right for us to split up, which isn't now or any time in the near future. I don't want you guys to feel awkward about picking a place, you should all be comfortable there too."

"You… you're buying a house?" Hermione finally understood the situation, it all clicked into place.

"We're buying a house."

"It's your money."

"It's our money."

"Draco…"

"Hermione… I'm being serious. You're my wife, it's our money and it'll be our house."

Before she could protest any more he pulled out a newspaper while sitting at the table, brandishing it open and cutting off any reply.

Harry laughed loudly and Blaise clapped his hands together a couple times while getting into the house search.

/

"This is it!" Hermione stated as Pansy and Ginny nodded emphatically at her sides.

It was a large home, not as large as Malfoy Manor, by any means, but was still big. They were standing in the middle of a large living room and Hermione felt as though she was home.

Draco grinned and walked away with the realtor to close the deal.

The house had six bedrooms, each with its own adjoining bathroom, two different living areas, a spacious kitchen with an eat in breakfast nook, a separate formal dining room, a laundry area with tons of storage space and large grounds with a beautiful garden, complete with its own Koi pond, swimming pool and gazebo.

The best part about the house, in Hermione's and Harry's opinion, was that it had muggle electricity. This was important to Hermione because she didn't want to lose all of herself, she wanted to hold on to something that would remind her of who she was, and they could all benefit from muggle electricity. Harry was excited to get a television.

Hermione watched Draco shake hands with the realtor, beaming with pride, and something in her heart gave way. She could easily picture having a family in this house with Draco, children running around bare foot and happy, their friends dropping in on them easily with no word beforehand. This was to be her life. She had originally wanted something smaller, something more fit for Hermione Granger, but then she realized that she was a Malfoy now and had to give in to the Malfoy way, at least a little bit.

She was brought out of her musings by arms wrapping around her waist, and she immediately leaned back into the solid chest behind her.

"This house is perfect," Draco said, leaning his face down into her hair.

"Ginny is owling Dumbledore now and Harry and I are going to go grab all of our trunks from the safe-house."

"We need to go shopping for furnishings," Pansy said, clearly thrilled about the idea while Hermione groaned inwardly. They should have bought a furnished house, but Draco would never, ever sleep in a bed in a house that he owned that had been used by a stranger previously.

"Actually," Draco said, seeing Hermione's face, "I brought these magazines. All we have to do is choose what we want and say it out loud and the pieces will appear."

"What about payment?" Pansy asked, and Hermione was surprised that she wasn't aware of this type of shopping.

"Don't worry about that, my father told me it would all be considered house warming presents."

Hermione was beyond shocked.

"He is going to pay for all the furnishings in our house?! Everything? That's… insane."

"Hermione," Pansy said, trying to stifle her laughter, "I don't think you're aware of the wealth you have married into. The Malfoy's could probably buy hundreds of houses this size, as well as furnish them, without even batting an eye."

Hermione was surprised. She knew that Draco's family was wealthy, but she had never really grasped just how much money they had. Draco pressed the magazines in her hands and pushed her forward slightly. Ginny looked almost out of place, and Hermione was sure she was uncomfortable about the way money was being exchanged today. First an entire, huge house, and now all the furnishings they would ever need for it? Ginny came from a family that had to buy second hand school robes and books, never mind their sketchy house that looked as though it needed to be held up by stilts.

The three girls perused the books while the boys levitated all of the appearing furniture to the proper places, setting the house up beautifully.

"We're getting a house elf."

"Draco Malfoy, we are not getting a _slave_!"

"We are. I want one, I've always had one and don't know how to cook or do laundry or anything even slightly useful when it comes to caring for a house." Hermione had her hands on her hips and was starting to narrow her eyes, "We can pay it though, if it will allow it to happen." Hermione stopped mid-glare.

"Really? You would allow us to pay?"

"If it will keep us both happy, then yes."

Hermione grinned.

/

Months, again flew by with many huge changes to the group. The Governors of Hogwarts had decided to close the school for Ginny's seventh year, so she never had to return and stayed living at Malfoy Manor Junior with her boyfriend and best friends. Hermione had, of course, received all O's in her NEWTs but Dumbledore requested that none of the six went out in the search for jobs, it wasn't wise for them to expose themselves while Voldemort was gaining power.

Draco continued to go to meetings with the Dark Lord and carry out his orders, but he felt as though something had changed in the dynamics of the death eaters, and he was sure to report this to Dumbledore every time he returned. Voldemort seemed meek, almost worn down. He was no spring chicken but he was years younger than Dumbledore himself, so Draco couldn't understand what was causing it.

Harry had been continuing his 'lessons' with Dumbledore, destroying horcruxes and learning everything he could about his rival, and the group came to the conclusion that Voldemort was beginning to feel worn down because his horcruxes and pieces of his soul were being eradicated without his knowledge.

Pansy and Blaise's relationship went from friends to dating not long after they all moved into the house, and not long after they were engaged, something which caused Hermione to feel slightly jealous about, but she was incredibly excited for them. They weren't going to get married until after the war but Pansy had already asked Hermione to be her maid-of-honour and Ginny to be a bridesmaid. After the war was over she would be able to have her best friends up there with her. Blaise had also asked Harry to be a groomsman, something that Harry seemed incredibly touched, and even surprised, about.

The war was on the horizon, they could almost see it. Voldemort was getting sneakier, but still hadn't shown himself completely. People knew that he was out there, biding his time, but he was waiting it out for some reason. There were many more killings now, and every time Harry heard of someone's death he felt a pang of guilt. If he just finished this then it would be over, but he and Dumbledore had one more horcrux to find, and Harry couldn't make his move until it was done.

They had converted one of the large unused bedrooms into a practice space so they could continue to hone their powers. They didn't want to lose any of their strengths now, and they wanted their intuition with the others to still be present.

The Weasley's didn't quite understand where Harry and Ginny were living, at first, because neither of them had mentioned Hermione and Draco's blood bond, but then, of course, Ron opened his mouth and let the whole story go one evening while he was a little bit imbibed, according to Fred. So once the family knew, Dumbledore told them the location of the house and they all came over for dinner one evening, much to Draco, Pansy and Blaise's dismay. The family was in awe of their house and even more surprised to learn of the events that had taken place.

Ron didn't attend the dinner.

Not that anyone was surprised by that.

Lucius and Narcissa had also dropped by a few times, enchanted with the 'little house' that Draco and Hermione chose for their future. Narcissa almost screamed when her eyes landed on Harry Potter, even though she was aware that he lived with her son she wasn't prepared to see him standing there innocently, not being hunted and actually looking quite happy and unafraid. She got herself together as Lucius started a comfortable conversation with Blaise and the rest of the evening went off without a hitch.

They attended the 'quaint home' again for dinner on Hermione and Draco's first year anniversary. They felt a little bit strange celebrating it, since it wasn't planned or wanted when it happened; Draco made a vow then and there that he would actually propose to Hermione after the war and allow her to have an actual wedding. She didn't even have a ring, for Merlin sake, just a rune on her body bearing his given name and a tattoo on her arm claiming his last.

"It's getting hard to stay diligent when the threat seems so far away," Pansy said one evening as the trees surrounding the grounds were dropping red and orange leaves to the ground.

"I know what you mean," Ginny agreed, sipping her hot chocolate in the cool evening air. The women were seated on the back balcony that led from the kitchens, looking over the grounds and enjoying each other's company.

"We just have to try and stay on top of things. Something could happen at any time without any sort of warning, but I do agree."

Hermione pointed her hand at her cooled drink, warming it back up with her elemental power before taking a sip. She set the mug back on her patio table and felt an odd feeling in her body.

She sat forward quickly, realizing what was happening.

She took down her mind blocks for a moment and felt a surge of pain. Draco was being tortured, something that hadn't occurred in a very long time.

"What is it?"

"Is it Draco?"

Pansy and Ginny spoke simultaneously and Hermione nodded.

"What would he be torturing Draco for now? He hasn't had to deal with any of that in months."

"I'm not sure, Ginny, but it isn't like it takes much to set Voldemort off. I just hope he's okay."

"I'm so glad you aren't extremely aware of his pain anymore, it used to scare the daylights out of me every time he left for a meeting."

No one said anything until Pansy muttered, "winter's on the horizon, it's starting to get chilly."

"I'm surprised it hasn't started snowing yet, to be honest, it is the end of November and with all these bloody dementors breeding it's colder than usual."

"It's kind of strange not being at school," Ginny said, "I don't want to go back next year when I'm 18 and complete my seventh year."

Hermione was going to reply and tell Ginny that she would definitely be completing her schooling if she had anything to do with it, but she heard something in the distance. A shouting.

She stood from her chair and narrowed her eyes, trying to see into the trees surrounding her house, but it was getting dark quickly outside and it was hard for her to see.

Ginny and Pansy flanked Hermione and then pulled her backward into the house, closing the door behind them.

"No one could find us though, we have the Fidelus charm."

"There are ways around it Pansy, all it takes is a traitor."

They turned off the lights quickly and stood in the kitchen, peeking out the windows and trying to see who was intruding on their property.

"It's Draco," Hermione gasped, seeing the flash of his white blond hair in the moonlight. She moved toward the door but Pansy grabbed her arm, stilling her movement.

"Pansy?"

"Just wait until he's a bit closer. Why would he be coming out of the woods? He's able to apparate right into the house."

Ginny seemed to think the entire situation was fishy as well. The figure was coming out of the woods now, staggering slightly.

"Talk to him in your mind Hermione, see what happens."

 _Draco?_

 _Draco, are you there? Why are you in the forest?_

 _Hermione, do not open the door._

Her blood ran cold.

 _Why not?_

 _I think I was followed, I don't think they can get into the grounds but just wait. I'll wait on the patio for a while and see what happens._

 _Why are you walking like that?_

 _Don't worry about it._

 _Draco! Why are you walking like that?_

He didn't answer her.

"Something's wrong," Hermione said, looking into the pale faces of Ginny and Pansy.

"What do you mean?"

"He said not to open the door because he thinks he was followed, but someone couldn't just follow him here, that doesn't make any sense. Unless he told them the location; which he obviously wouldn't have."

"I'm going to get Harry and Blaise," Ginny said immediately, rushing from the kitchen.

Draco was on the patio now, sitting on a chair and looking out toward the woods. Throwing caution to the wind, Hermione stepped forward and slapped on the outside lights, just as Blaise and Harry entered the room.

Draco was slumped in the chair, his clothes bloody, even from the back. Hermione opened her pain block in her mind again and didn't feel anything from Draco.

Things were getting scary.

Things were strange, and she didn't like that.

"Oi!" Blaise yelled, seeing Draco covered in blood on the back patio. He rushed forward and opened the door before he even took a moment to wonder why everyone was standing in the kitchen looking at him, but not attempting to help him.

"No!" Pansy yelled as Blaise flung himself outside and pulled a protesting Draco into the house.

Draco looked at Harry, pain in his eyes, "Go to Order, tell them to be on stand-by."

"What?"

"Go, Harry!"

Harry apparated away without another word.

"Draco what the hell happened?!"

"I think they know. I don't know how, but I think they know."

"Know what?"

Hermione was suddenly terrified.

"Know that we are all living together. I don't think they know about other things but I do think they know about that, and worse, I think they know where we are."

"How could they know that?!"

"Someone who already knows of our location had to of told them."

"Who would tell them, though?"

Draco didn't answer, and by his silence he told Hermione that he knew exactly who had given up their location, but he didn't want to say. "I was attacked viciously tonight, but not murdered, and I can't figure out why they let me live. I swear I was followed here, I didn't want to bring anyone to you guys but I didn't realize I was followed until I was already on our grounds, I could hear things…"

"We need to get out of here, then!" Ginny yelled, and Hermione took Draco's hand and turned on the spot.

Nothing happened.

"Shit, they put up wards so we can't apparate out!"

"Good thing Harry got out," Blaise said, pulling his wand from his pocket. The rest of the friends followed suit, and as a unit they moved out of the kitchen and into the more spacious living room.

Out of muggle habit, Hermione approached the door and locked it.

Draco laughed in spite of his current condition and she instantly felt like a moron. Locking the door wouldn't do them any good.

"Silly mudblood," they heard from behind them, a familiar voice that Hermione didn't want to believe she was hearing, especially calling her that name.

"What are you doing here?" She asked, before turning around to face him. She knew the voice, she knew who it was, but she wasn't expecting a death eater mask to be covering his face, black robes billowing out as though it was windy.

"So you ratted us out, then?" Hermione asked him, feeling physically ill all of a sudden and Ginny looked like she was going to pass out.

"I told them that you all live together, yes. My master knows that Malfoy is a traitor of the worst kind, befriending Harry Potter and spying on the dark for almost a year."

Hermione suddenly knew that Ron hadn't told Voldemort about their blood bond or their elemental powers. He seemed reluctant to say much to Hermione but he was making it clear to not say anything about the other facts out loud, which meant there were more people listening in.

"Why would you do this?"

Blaise was now holding Ginny steady, she was taking the betrayal very hard, indeed.

"You guys didn't want me, I had to go to someone who did. Someone who would appreciate my information and treat me like I mattered. I loved you, Hermione, and you kicked me in the heart. Harry was my best friend and he chose you over me, no question. I hate Malfoy and I don't care if he dies, now." I don't care if _you_ die, now, Ron was clearly saying.

Hermione shivered.

"Enough catch up," A cold voice said, and a wild haired woman moved out of the shadows, her heavy lidded eyes peering at Draco in pure disgust.

"Living with the enemy?"

Swarms of Death Eaters suddenly entered the room and each student was held tightly, disarmed and their arms behind their backs before they could even comprehend what was happening.

"Leave the mudblood," Bellatrix said coldly as Draco, Blaise, Ginny and Pansy were pulled from the room.

Bellatrix was regarding Hermione with a cold sneer, "Where is Harry Potter?" She asked, fingering her wand. All of Hermione's training leaked from her brain, all sensible thoughts of protecting herself were gone. She was terrified by the look in Bellatrix's eyes, and now that her closest friends had been pulled from the room, defenseless, she didn't know what to do.

She had trained for this, dammit! Then why couldn't she even form any words?

"Where is Harry Potter?!" Bellatrix screeched, advancing on Hermione, who was standing stock still, surrounded by the Death Eaters who hadn't taken her friends away, and Ron who was looking smug.

"I don't know," Hermione muttered, and seconds later her knees buckled as she was put under the cruciatus curse. She tried to fight the pain off, but was unsuccessful, and when the curse was lifted she was laying on the floor, panting in pain, and Bellatrix was kneeling at her side.

"Tell me where he is!" She yelled at Hermione insanely.

Hermione shook her head before saying in a broken voice, "I don't know where he is!"

This time the pain was almost unbearable, and she knew her voice was ripping from her throat in loud screams.

When the curse was lifted there was a knife at her throat and Bellatrix was straddling her. She pulled the knife away from her throat and began to lift her left sleeve, saying, "I'll give you a reminder of where you stand, mudblood," and Hermione began fighting in earnest now, panicked at the thought of Bellatrix seeing her arm. She would know what her mark meant, her sister, Narcissa, was a Malfoy, after all.

"No," she screamed, bucking her body, trying to fight the demented woman off, but all this got her was a sharp slap to the face and the knife plunged into her side.

She screamed in pain now, the stab wound throbbing fiercely, but she was still trying to stop the woman from lifting her sleeve.

To no avail, of course.

Bellatrix went completely still on top of her when she bared the Malfoy family crest, in a deep state of surprise.

"Is this what I think it is?" She said incredulously.

 _Get out, Draco! You need to get out!_

"I guess that depends on what you think it is," Hermione said cheekily, earning her another slap in the face.

 _What's happening?_

 _She saw my mark, you need to get out, now. Please!_

"I think that this is the Malfoy family crest on your unworthy arm, which could only mean one thing."

Hermione struggled in vain again, trying desperately to get free, while she heard murmurs from surrounding Death Eaters about her proclamation about the mark on Hermione's arm.

 _I'm not leaving you behind._

 _Go!_

 _I won't!_

"Bring the boy!"

"Which boy, ma'am?"

"Which boy? WHICH BOY?! The Malfoy boy, you imbecile!"

Bellatrix seemed almost afraid, suddenly, and Hermione couldn't quite figure out why.

"We've been betrayed more than we even knew," she moaned, heaving herself off of Hermione's body suddenly and moving to a group of Death Eaters, "Betrayed!"

"Doesn't feel so nice, does it?" Hermione asked, with an obvious look at Ron as she pulled herself up from the floor, looking slightly surprised at the blood puddle that had formed below her.

Before Hermione was even aware of what was happening, a fight had broken out between the Death Eaters in the room. Two were firing spells at the others, Ron included, and taking them out with intense precision. It was the shortest fight she had ever experienced, and a bunch of Death Eaters who were intimidating her just moments before, were now splayed out on the floor.

Two Death Eaters entered the room with a struggling, still bloody Draco in between them, he was fighting to get free from their hold and when they dropped his arms in surprise at seeing their comrades on the floor he ran straight to Hermione, who was bleeding profusely from the side and was feeling very dizzy. He wrapped his arms around her and she collapsed back into him, a dark stain spreading across her shirt from her left side.

"No, no, no," He said, panicked, as the two Death Eaters who brought him into the room were thrown to the ground in death to join the others.

"Hermione," He said, and his voice cracked as he started to feel weak and dizzy as well.

Another Death Eater entered the room as both Draco and Hermione fell to the floor in each other's arms. He took one look at the scene and seemed to figure out what had happened. He backed away quickly, a killing curse narrowly missing him, and the magic in the air changed as several loud pops filled the air.

The Death Eater had dropped the anti-apparation wards and fled the scene, and moments later Harry and certain members of the order appeared in the room.

"What happened?!" Blaise yelled, running in through a doorway, "They just dropped us and disapparated, not even taking us with them!"

"Hermione?!" Harry yelled, running forward.

"Oh, Merlin, Draco!"

"Don't die, please, don't die!"

"We need some help over here!"

Snape and Lucius pulled off their Death Eater masks and ran forward to inspect the two teenagers who were laying on the floor. Hermione had a huge blood stain on the side of her body and was extremely pale, and Draco still bore the bloodstains and concurring wounds he had received earlier at the hands of the Death Eaters.

"Apparate them to St. Mungos, Potter, Zabini!" Lucius yelled, transfiguring Draco's clothes, "Now!" he screamed at them when the two boys made no move. "I will change, get Narcissa to safety and meet you there, I can't go there like this."

Harry stood up to follow Mr. Malfoy's orders, but at that exact moment he saw fiery red hair peeking out from behind one of the fallen Death Eaters masks. He moved forward quickly and ripped the mask from Ron Weasley's face, his blue eyes glazed with death.

Harry's breath caught in his throat and he seemed to shut down, causing Pansy to move forward and put her hand on his shoulder. The ultimate betrayal, this would take some time to get over.

Ginny ran forward to where Blaise was lifting Draco and held onto Hermione the best she could so she could apparate away and get them the help they needed. Harry would be fine with Pansy, and would be at St. Mungos shortly, she was sure.


	12. Chapter 12

**A/N- This is the last chapter and it also includes the epilogue! I really hope everyone enjoyed reading Blood Bound and will also love the ending! Thank you to everyone who reviewed/favourited/followed! It honestly means so much to me! Thanks for all the love!**

 **Shananigans xox**

 **Chapter 12**

Ginny was standing beside one hospital bed that contained both Hermione and Malfoy, they would live, thank Merlin, and at the moment they were sleeping, clutching each other tightly.

Hermione's stab wound hadn't been dire, and she had only passed out because of the loss of blood she experienced. She was weak, and Draco followed suit. Hermione's wound had been healed, leaving behind an angry red scar that would hopefully disappear in time. Draco had to have many wounds healed, as well as bruises and some internal injuries, leaving behind many marks on his pale skin; the healers were quick to do their jobs and fix the two without asking too many awkward questions. They were used to people coming in looking as though they had been tortured, especially in these times. Draco nor Hermione had woken up yet, not even when the Healer forced blood replenishing potion down their throats.

Pansy's voice could be heard in the corridor, yelling at some innocent bystander to tell her where her best friends were, and Ginny popped her head out of the door while the male nurse spluttered incoherently.

"We're here, Pansy, Harry."

The two rushed forward and into the room, and Ginny immediately let them know that everything was fine.

"This is my fault," Harry said, gazing down at his best friend and her husband.

Pansy threw her hands into the air, obviously she had had enough of his moping.

"For Merlin's sake, Potter, did you send Weasley out there to give up our house!? No! So stop whining, already. He obviously got the information from his family members when they were invited to visit, and who would have honestly expected this to happen? It's no one's fault but his and I'm getting really tired of hearing you take the blame. Plus, Ginny just said that they're going to be fine, so cut it out!"

Blaise moved forward and embraced Pansy, who was obviously taking the attack harder than anyone realized, since she immediately broke down and started sobbing into his chest.

"They'll know everything now."

Blaise said it as a statement, and before anyone could answer him Lucius and Narcissa burst through the door, followed closely by Dumbledore and Severus.

"Oh, my children!" Narcissa whimpered, moving to the bed and gazing down at her son and daughter-in-law, tears in her eyes.

"The stab wound?" Lucius asked the room at large as he stared at the hospital bed.

"Non-threatening and healed."

"Draco's injuries?"

"Also taken care of. Blood loss is what caused them to faint. They're fine other than some scarring, apparently they just need the rest."

As Blaise said this, Draco's eyes fluttered open and he immediately sat up straight, staring down at Hermione.

"You're both fine, son," Lucius said.

Draco nodded, but looked relieved nonetheless.

"They know everything now," Blaise said again, this time looking at Dumbledore. "Why did they leave us and apparate away, empty handed?"

"I'm not sure, Mr. Zabini, but I'm sure they had their reasons. Maybe they were just surprised to see so many of their comrades fallen, but I'm not sure."

Hermione groaned and Draco jumped from the bed, grabbing a goblet and pouring a glass of water from the pitcher on the side table. She opened her eyes and sat up and Draco thrust the water into her hands. She looked at him gratefully before taking a sip, and then grinned.

"I'm so glad everyone is alright! That was slightly terrifying."

Ginny almost giggled at her words, and figured it must have been because she was so relieved.

"Slightly terrifying?" Pansy moaned into Blaise's chest, her tears subsiding.

"How do you feel?" Draco asked, staring at her.

"Fine, actually. You?"

He let out a breath.

"Good. Glad you're okay."

"You can't go back to your home, Mr. Malfoy. They know where it is now and we can't take that chance. Although, I honestly feel like this is the beginning of the end."

"I'm sorry, you guys. I was a total let down. I was so terrified it was just like I forgot everything we learned…"

"Don't apologize, we weren't much help. We let ourselves get captured much too easily."

Blaise reached into his pocket and moved to the bed, handing Hermione and Draco their wands. "A Death Eater dropped these before he disapparated, which is also strange but at least we don't have to get new ones."

"I'm sure you know that you can't return to your home either," Dumbledore said, looking at Lucius and Narcissa.

Lucius nodded.

"I'm sorry I blew our cover, Severus, I just couldn't let anything more happen to my daughter-in-law, and then they started to bring my only son in, and I lost it."

Hermione was mildly surprised to hear him say that.

"I completely understand."

"We should go," Dumbledore said, striding to the door. He stopped when he realized no one was following him, "All of us, now."

"Where are we going, Sir?" Harry asked, leading Ginny, who still seemed to be in a slight state of shock over her brothers' betrayal, to follow.

"Hogwarts, of course," he answered, as though it was the most obvious thing in the world.

Draco helped Hermione from the bed as his mother watched his actions closely with love in her eyes.

The group cleared out quickly, flooing to the headmaster's office in Hogwarts.

/

Each couple was given their own room at Hogwarts, they weren't anything special but it was enough to make them happy, for the time being. Hermione couldn't help but agree with Dumbledore about the attack on the beloved home she shared with her friends being the beginning of the end. Voldemort knew everything now. He knew that she and Draco were married and that two of his Death Eaters had defected and betrayed the rest, and it wouldn't have been hard for him to figure out who those two were. Especially when Lucius only returned home for mere moments to retrieve his wife, and neither had gone back.

A few days after they arrived at Hogwarts, Hermione walked into the Great Hall, which had just one table in it at this point, for breakfast. Harry gave her a slightly apologetic look before he handed over the Daily Prophet. Hermione rolled her eyes, conveying that she didn't believe anything that paper wrote anymore.

"Just read it," Harry said.

Hermione glanced down, eyes widening the moment she read the headline.

" _Draco Malfoy marries muggleborn and betrays He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named!_

 _Our very own Rita Skeeter has discovered a shocking truth about the Malfoy heir. He and none other than Hermione Granger, muggleborn witch and best friend of the Chosen One, Harry Potter, have been married for over a year! The Malfoy patriarchs are apparently well aware of the situation, and have been for the entire marriage. Another shocking truth is that Lucius Malfoy, as well as his son Draco, and good friend, Severus Snape, have been working against You-Know-Who from the inside- Story continued on page 4._ "

"Well… it's definitely out of the bag, now."

"That's going to be quite the scandal, once the war is over," Harry said, almost laughing at her.

"People are definitely going to be surprised," Hermione said, quietly. She looked around the table and saw Lucius and Narcissa hunched over the paper together at the end, both looking surprised.

"How did she find out?" Harry said, more to himself.

"Obviously back to her old ways," Hermione answered irritated, "Oh, I'm going to get so much hate mail from all those witches with dreams of marrying into the Malfoy fortune."

Harry laughed and Pansy grinned at her from a few seats down.

Hermione's prediction about the hate mail wasn't false, but instead of reading them she just instantly threw them into the fire, instructing everyone else to do the same if they came across any letters addressed to her from unknown addresses. Howlers about how she was unworthy would explode at random intervals throughout the days, but Draco would just grip her hand and tell her to ignore them.

The Weasley family were in shock since the moment they had found out about Ron's betrayal. A ministry employee contacted them the day after the fight, after they had cleared Malfoy Manor Junior of bodies and identified everyone. They held a small funeral for him to pay their respects to who he had once been. Harry, Hermione and Ginny didn't attend, mainly because they felt it would make them vulnerable and open for an attack. Also, since Ron had, once again, almost got Hermione and Draco killed, never mind the fact that he gave up Harry's location to be captured and taken to Voldemort, disregarding his own sisters safety… she didn't feel like any of them really needed to be paying their respects. Harry and Ginny were both taking his betrayal hard, and apparently Molly and Arthur were having a hard time coming to terms with everything that had taken place.

"We found it!" Harry screamed to his friends, who were training in a classroom far from everyone's chambers, late one evening.

"Found what, Harry?" Ginny asked, stepping closer to her boyfriend and taking his hand while everyone else gathered around them in a loose, half circle.

"The last horcrux."

"What was it?" Hermione gasped, intensely interested in the dark magic that Harry had been battling for the last couple years.

"It was ridiculous, to be completely honest, and it was in this freakin school the entire time! Tom Riddle was much too arrogant for his own good. He hid the lost diadem of Ravenclaw, which was never really lost at all, in the Room of Requirement, for Merlin's sake. He thought he was the only one who knew anything about this bloody castle."

The students all started talking at once, excitement cutting through the air at the significance of Harry's proclamation. Voldemort could be killed, now.

The group took to hard training again, feeling as though they had failed miserably during the last attack. They couldn't afford to do that again; they needed to remember how to work seamlessly as a group again. It didn't take them long to get back into the swing of things but Hermione was concerned about the way she had frozen last time. If she did that again she would certainly be killed, her and Draco were almost as much of a target as Harry was, at this point.

"We can do it," Draco told her whenever he sensed her doubts.

The snow was melting again, winter passed by quickly in a haze of learning and fear; fear caused by lack of word about Voldemort. He hadn't tried to seek them out, and it unnerved everyone. Since the school was closed, the entire Order was now residing in the castle, and the lack of students gave them the space they needed to train properly; at any point the youngsters could be seen running through the halls or grounds, half on the attack while the other three were on the defense. It helped them learn the area even more than they already knew it, which, in the long run, was life-saving.

The Weasley patriarchs, for the most part, avoided the children. They still treated Ginny the same since she was their daughter, but Hermione noticed that Mrs. Weasley hadn't tried to speak to her once, unless it was during dinner, since they arrived in January. Hermione was grateful that all of the Weasley children seemed to be the same and treat her and Harry as they used to, even though so many things had changed over the last year and a half.

Hermione's doubts about her power and their fluidity as a group cleared as time passed, and Draco was glad he didn't have to reassure her anymore. She was the most talented witch he knew and he was secretly getting tired of having to remind her of that on a regular basis.

"What are you doing out here?" Draco asked her one summer evening, sitting on the steps at the front of the castle in the warm air. It was beginning to get dark, the large full moon bathing the grounds in an eerie glow.

"Just thinking."

"What are you thinking about?"

She gave him a look, he could have easily entered her mind and listened to her thoughts if he had wanted to, and then she realized that she was extremely grateful he didn't. Just because he had the power to do it, he wasn't abusing it and taking advantage of it.

"I'm just ready for this to be over. I want to have a regular life with you, I want to have a family and be back in our beautiful home, which probably isn't so beautiful anymore, and just be happy. The stress from waiting around for this war has left me feeling drained and somewhat sick a lot lately. I want it to be done."

"We will both be twenty soon enough."

"I know. I feel like we have grown so much – can you believe we've been bonded almost two years already? We've matured way beyond our ages."

Draco was nodding along, agreeing with her.

"It's hard to be immature when you're surrounded by the threat of death."

"They'll come after us personally."

"I think so, too. I betrayed them in the worst possible way, and they know it."

Hermione sighed and leaned her head on his shoulder.

"I don't regret it."

"Regret what, Hermione?"

"I don't look back on our blood bond with any regret. I never, ever expected that I would be so happy with you, so happy and secure."

Draco chuckled.

"I know what you mean, but I honestly don't regret any of it either. It's so wonderful to have real friends now, other than Pansy and Blaise, and I truly do consider Harry and Ginny to be friends of mine. I never thought it was possible, and it changed my parents' lives too, you know? They've accepted everything pretty gracefully, and I'm really proud of them for that. I love you Hermione Malfoy, more than I ever thought I would."

"I love you too, Draco, so much that it scares me sometimes."

"Bush-bush," Draco said, laughter in his eyes as he patted her hair.

"What?"

"What?" Draco asked back, innocently.

"Why do you randomly call me 'bush head' or 'bush-bush'?"

"I remember when I was younger, I would look at you and all I could see was your hair, it was so bushy and frizzy and made you look larger than you were. I had a hard time thinking of insults that didn't involve your hair, and then as I was growing up I realized that your hair was getting smaller and I was still an arse. I look back on it longingly, I never liked you, but I did admire you. I can just picture myself sitting there, moaning about your hair to whoever would listen because that, and the fact that you were a muggleborn, was the only things I had to insult you with. But you know what? I love your hair, and I love that you're a muggleborn. Since I don't think you would be overly pleased if I referred to your blood status in a joking, yet still loving and longing way, I will comment on the hair."

Hermione had no idea what to say to that.

Draco just smiled.

"My life is completely different than I ever expected it to be," He said after a few moments, "but I can't imagine it being any other way."

"What is that?" Hermione asked suddenly, without answering Draco as she stood up, looking toward the front gates. Draco stood up a bit too, following her gaze.

There was a blue light that seemed to hit the gates and spread out in a misty glow numerous times. He watched as it happened four times in a row and suddenly came to the conclusion that someone was trying to force the gates open, despite the protective enchantments cast around the school.

"It's them," he breathed, standing up fully and reaching for Hermione's hand.

Hermione squeezed his hand and felt movement around her, aware of her friends and the Order members joining them on the entrance steps.

"How did you know?" Hermione asked, looking at Harry.

"Dumbledore could tell the enchantments were trying to be breached."

"This is it then," Draco spoke firmly and calmly, almost happy that either way, tonight it would be over.

"Remember your training!" Dumbledore said sternly.

The six friends nodded and moved off of the stairs, farther into the grounds; they didn't seem afraid at all, something that the adults in the Order of the Phoenix found amazing, as they too moved away from the castle.

Hermione and Draco broke away from their friends and went to the right together as the gates at the entrance were finally broken open, admitting at least a few dozen Death Eaters. It seemed that Voldemort wasn't able to recruit many people since Lucius and Severus decimated his henchmen in Draco and Hermione's home many months before.

At least their numbers were more evenly matched now, Hermione thought to herself moments before she heard hair-raising howling coming from behind the black robed figures.

"Werewolves," Draco breathed, clutching her hand tightly.

Hermione shivered slightly, the sound the werewolves were emitting was enough to curdle her blood.

A large group of Death Eaters immediately began advancing on Draco and Hermione as their companions headed straight for the adults at the front of the castle. Draco looked around and saw that Blaise, Pansy and Ginny were nowhere in sight, and then he glanced at Hermione and flashed a grin before thrusting his hands out in front of him and shooting icicles at the Death Eaters who were advancing on them. One screamed as his arm was impaled all the way through, falling to the ground. Hermione countered his attack and started shooting her tell-tale firebombs, they floated meaningfully toward the enemy and upon contact exploded.

The Death Eaters were caught off guard by this type of attack and fell back quickly, unfortunately they fell back right into Ginny, Pansy and Blaise who were waiting for them to retreat, as they figured they would. The three made quick work of the six Death Eaters, this was war, after all, and the three cast their killing curses efficiently.

Hermione heard more howling and vicious snarling as the werewolves came farther into the grounds, she looked to Draco with fright in her eyes and suddenly the ground was shaking. Hermione looked back toward the gates and saw giants flooding through, followed closely by trolls.

"Oh my…"

"We knew he would use everything he could."

Hermione opened her mouth but before she could get any words out she saw many people materialize into thin air, people who were there to aid in the war against Voldemort and his followers. Obviously the wards on the castle were completely knocked down, now.

Hermione was suddenly wrenched to the left as a werewolf lunged at her and Draco pushed her ahead of him, running back toward the castle and away from the new threats. Hermione glanced back and saw a familiar wolf lunge at the one who tried to attack her.

"Looks like Voldemort wasn't able to convince all the werewolves to take his side," Hermione yelled to Draco over the noise of the battle, and he glanced back in time to see Remus Lupin viciously rip out a dark werewolf's throat.

"Gory," he yelled back to her, pushing her closer to the castle a bit more before slowing and taking in their surroundings.

Draco and Hermione donned their wands and moved forward, but split apart as they jumped into the now full-fledged fight between the Order and the Death Eaters. Things were getting ugly, fast, and Hermione watched as a Death Eater ruthlessly struck down Dedalus Diggle. Hermione screamed in rage and stupefied the offending Death Eater before moving on, trying to find Harry. Hermione and Draco had agreed beforehand that they had to keep Harry as safe as possible, and with their power they could do that.

 _Draco, I want to practice the shield one more time!_

 _Seriously, woman?_

 _Please!_

Hermione saw a Death Eater running straight for her, screaming out loud at her.

"You turned my brother-in-laws family, you little mudblood bitch!"

"Defodio!" She yelled, aiming at Rodolphus Lestrange's broad chest.

"Protego," he said quietly, quickly followed by, "Crucio"

Hermione barely blocked the curse, but she just managed to before it hit her, and then Draco was at her side. He grabbed her hand and since their emotions were in such a high state their magic was electrifying.

They raised their wands and simultaneously yelled, "Protego!" as Lestrange tried to attack them again, and they conjured such a powerful shield that it could easily be seen by the naked eye, glimmering slightly in the night air and reaching at least twenty feet high and equally as wide.

Rodolphus stumbled away from them before he was attacked by Hestia Jones, causing Hermione and Draco to turn around and dive back into the fight.

In the moments they had been distracted by LeStrange, the fight had intensified, but they noticed that there was many more Death Eaters and creatures fighting for the dark littering the ground than Order members.

Just as Hermione was wondering why Voldemort hadn't shown himself yet, she felt the air grow cold and knew that Dementors were on their way into the grounds.

"Expecto Patronum!" she called and heard many other's yell the same spell, concentrating their energy on happy thoughts while the dementors were all driven out, far away from the castle. Their distraction paid off though, the Death Eaters had managed to strike down a couple more Order members, and Hermione knew that Voldemort would show himself soon. Thinking about him made her remember she was trying to find Harry, and she took off running again, Draco hot on her heels.

They entered the castle and dodged curses while running up the main staircase, searching for Harry.

"Harry!" she yelled, seeing his unkempt hair above his glasses, which were reflecting the moonlight from a nearby window on the second floor, and he turned to her as soon as he struck down the Death Eater he was fighting.

"Harry Potter," a voice hissed, seemingly from all around them. "Give yourself up, Harry Potter, and save your friends and family. So many have died already."

"Don't listen to him, Harry!" Draco yelled as Harry's face fell slightly.

Pansy, Blaise and Ginny came streaking down the hallway toward them and skidded to a halt in front of them.

"We know this castle and its grounds like no other, Harry," Pansy said, reaching out to him, "we have trained here for months. We can beat them!"

"All six of us together, we can do this!" Blaise exclaimed.

Ginny stepped forward and kissed Harry lightly on the lips, "Don't let him get to you. Everyone who is here wants to be here, they want to fight for us."

Harry nodded, looking relieved that his friends were still sticking with him.

"Crucio!"

Hermione suddenly fell to her knees as Draco let out an anguished yell, spinning to face the Death Eater who was cursing his wife. Harry disarmed the man quickly and the curse broke, Hermione's cries stopped and were replaced with deep breaths. Before anyone could do anything, Draco advanced on the man, thrusting out his right palm, since his wand was in his dominant left hand, and shot an icicle straight into the man's heart.

He looked surprised for a moment and looked down at his chest, confusion donning his features.

"Rot in hell," Draco said darkly, before reaching his palm out again and impaling the Death Eater right between the eyes. He dropped back and moved no more.

"Nice one," Harry said, as the group ran forward to join Draco before they all took off down the hallway to jump back into the battle.

"Stay near us, Harry," Draco warned at the top of the stairs. They looked down the steps and Pansy and Blaise ran forward and joined into the battle, fighting brilliantly, each countering the other's spells like a seamless team.

Hermione summoned her power from deep within and suddenly jumped off of the balcony, Draco cried out and ran forward, looking down. He watched her land on her feet before dropping harshly to all fours, and when she did this the floor beneath some of the werewolves suddenly burned bright red; the werewolves howled in agony as the smell of burnt fur and flesh filled the air. The werewolves were aflame, and began running around frantically, trying to rid themselves of the flames.

While they were distracted by their flaming bodies people fighting for the light struck them down systematically, decimating the werewolf numbers.

Draco watched the ensuing chaos and felt a surge of pride toward his wife, especially when he saw that there were a few bloody masses on the floor, obviously humans who had been attacked by werewolves, and he was unable to tell whether the people belonged to the light or the dark.

He turned to say something to Harry and the dark haired boy dashed away from him, heading down the stairs. Draco cursed and chased behind him, confident that Hermione would find them after she was done burning werewolves. There were battles still happening outside the castle, and Draco heard Pansy yelling at someone before Ginny struck the offending person down.

Draco was almost enthralled and forgot about what he was doing temporarily while he watched Blaise, Pansy and Ginny fight seamlessly as a team. Their training had really paid off. He was brought back to his senses as he was hit from behind by a curse. He fell face forward hard, his back on fire.

Literally.

He quickly extinguished it with his elemental power and stood up, facing the Death Eater that would attack someone with their back turned.

Amycus Carrow.

"Sectumsempra!" Draco shouted, going straight for the brutal curses, but unfortunately it missed the Death Eater and he retaliated quickly, shooting hexes at Draco quickly. Draco put up a shield and maintained it, blocking all of the curses that were being thrown haphazardly at him. He decided he had had enough and was going to use his elemental powers, but before he could even lower his shield Blaise was there, attacking Amycus with all of his might.

"Avada Kedavra!" Blaise yelled, as Ginny and Pansy put a shield charm around Blaise to help him deflect the curses the nasty Death Eater was firing at him and Draco in turn. He may have been stupid but he was quicker than they had anticipated. Blaise's killing curse struck the fat man directly in his chest, killing him before he even hit the ground with a ghost of his insane smile still plastered across his face.

"Thanks, mate!" Draco yelled, running to catch up with Harry again, his friends following.

"Draco!" he heard, and turned quickly to see Hermione running as hard as she could toward him, her face blazing with anger. "Where the hell is Harry?" she yelled, and then stopped abruptly beside him, clutching a stitch in her side.

Draco gestured in the direction Harry was running before he got caught up with Amycus Carrow and everyone looked in that direction. Harry was running back toward them all off in the distance and they ran forward again, meeting him beside the greenhouses.

"These fucking Dark creatures are taking over the grounds," Harry seethed, gesturing out with his hand and Hermione gasped as she realized that there were acromantula fleeing the forest, which was billowing great clouds of smoke from deep within.

"What were you doing?! Why did you run out here like that?"

"I'm trying to find Voldemort! I want to finish this!"

"Well don't take off without us anymore," Draco seethed, annoyed at the brunet.

Neville Longbottom and Luna Lovegood, followed by other Gryffindor students Hermione had graduated with were running out of the greenhouses, lobbing plants that looked suspiciously like devils snare at the offending creatures and people. Neville aimed one at a Death Eater who was getting a little bit too close, and he dropped to the ground, writhing around as the devils snare tightened its hold, eventually squeezing all of the air and life from him.

Everyone cheered and headed toward the castle with armfuls of dangerous plants, following Neville's lead.

Draco and Hermione shared an incredulous look and the six friends took off in their wake. They were close to the castle when Harry stopped suddenly, clutching his scar in a way that Hermione hadn't witnessed in a long while.

"Harry Potter," a cold voice hissed, and they all turned to see Lord Voldemort standing there with his wand pointed at Harry, smiling.

"Oh and the betrayer and his lovely wife," he sneered, his cold, red eyes landing on Hermione and Draco.

Before any of them could make a move Draco lifted his hands and Voldemort hissed in pain, wrapping an arm around his chest as though he was having trouble breathing.

"That's right, a betrayer, and you should remember that I have no fear of you," Draco said, dropping his hands as Voldemort looked at him incredulously, seeming to be at a loss for words momentarily. He was suddenly engulfed in a tornado like mass; it wasn't moving his body, but it was whipping around him in a frenzy, burning his skin slightly. Hermione wasn't going in for the kill, so to speak, she just wanted to show Voldemort what she was capable of.

The tornado stopped and Draco was smiling wider, "Nor does my wife," he added, extremely glad that the Order were keeping the Death Eaters busy far away from the area they were in. Voldemort looked angry now, angry at being humiliated by children.

Hermione grabbed Draco's hand tightly, and this time she let her power get a little out of control, her hair whipping wildly around her head as her eyes began to glow eerily, closely followed by Draco. Voldemort started moving his mouth and both students shouted, "Protego!" and the shield was so powerful that Voldemort flew backward and landed on his back a few feet away.

Terrified by what he just witnessed.

Death Eaters started advancing once they saw their Master on the ground, scrambling to his feet, but there weren't many Death Eaters left now, not that many Order members were alive either.

The Death Eaters stopped abruptly when they saw what was happening with Draco and Hermione, they were shocked and also slightly put off, how could they manage against a force so strong?

At their distraction Harry advanced and Voldemort's eyes widened by the brazenness of the boy, Harry lifted his wand, but even after all of his training practices he still wasn't as quick as Voldemort, who lifted his wand and shouted "Avada Kedavra."

Right as the curse had left Voldemort's wand, someone jumped in between the boy and the Dark Lord, absorbing the curse into his chest before he gracefully fell to the ground. Hermione and Draco's energy snapped off and they almost fell to the ground as Draco let out a hoarse, anguished yell.

Voldemort seemed to be surprised by the night's events and this was the moment Harry chose for his attack. He knew that Draco wouldn't be any help to him now, and Harry quickly shouted the killing curse as everyone was distracted and Voldemort was battered to the ground moments after he killed a man.

He did not fall nearly as gracefully as Lucius Malfoy did when death took him.

The Death Eaters were all trying to escape, now that their leader had fallen to his demise, and Hermione took a page out of Draco's book; pushing her grief aside she focused on trapping the enemies in their own fiery cages. They formed in the air like glowing spears and buried themselves in the ground in a tight formation around each Death Eater. They were unable to apparate out of the grounds, as Dumbledore put the wards back in the place the moment Voldemort was slain, and they couldn't put the fires out with their wands, they were trapped until Hermione felt fit to release them.

She turned away and picked her way through the bodies, back toward Draco, who was kneeling beside his father. He wasn't yelling anymore, but he was shaking slightly, his hands in his hair. Harry was being clapped on the back by the remaining Order members, but he seemed much too sombre to accept the pats. Hermione turned her gaze, looking for her other friends and saw them all sitting on the steps to the entrance of the castle, where Hermione and Draco had been sitting mere hours ago, relatively happy. Ginny looked as though she had blood on her face and hands, and she was crying. Blaise looked singed, as though he had been on fire at some point and Pansy was trying to console Ginny, but didn't look too hurt in any way.

Hermione was relieved that her best friends, the most important people in her life, were all at least alive. She moved to Draco and put her hand on his shoulder, looking around for Narcissa and anxiety twisted her stomach when she didn't see her. She turned the other way and saw her finally, off in the distance, on her knees with her face in her hands.

Draco stood up suddenly and turned, squeezing Hermione in his arms tightly, his face bowed into her neck.

"Your father died a hero, Draco," Harry said, coming up beside him and putting his hand on his arm, "I want you to remember that. If he hadn't done what he did, I would have died for sure."

Draco lifted his head and stared Harry right in the eye. He let go of Hermione and turned to the raven-haired boy before he pulled him into a hug. Something that was totally unexpected by both Harry and Hermione, and Harry's eyes widened in surprise, but Draco dropped his arms quickly, backing away and looking for his mother.

"Thank you for saying that, Harry."

Harry nodded as Draco walked away, and then his eyes met with Hermione's and they shared an incredulous look before splitting up. Harry went to Ginny and Hermione followed Draco to Narcissa's side to try and console the poor woman; she was half way to them when another sob filled the air, and she whipped around to see Harry leaning down over a few bodies. She felt her chest tighten and hurried over to Harry, fear in her chest.

Molly Weasley and Nymphadora Tonks were laying amid other order members, and Hermione understood why Harry was taking this so hard. Molly was like a parent to him, despite everything that had happened with Ron, and he and Tonks were almost like kindred spirits, he had spent much more time with her than anyone else their age.

Hermione paid her respects to the two bodies on the ground, as well as the rest, Death Eaters, acquaintances and Order members alike, as she made her way back to her family. Hermione helped Draco get Narcissa to her feet and move her to the castle, where they waited for the Ministry members to come and take the captured Death Eaters, who were still residing in their fiery cages, to the Ministry. The Minister would have to reinstate the Dementors at Azkaban before anyone could be taken there for their crimes.

"I just want to go home," Narcissa whispered heavily.

"I know, Mum," Draco said, tears in his eyes, clasping Hermione's hand tightly in his own.

 **Epilogue**

Hermione walked into her house, finally being allowed back in it, and slipped off her black flats.

"I'm glad that's over with," Draco said, following her into the house and undoing his tie.

"It was beautiful, though. The ministry really went all out."

"It was nice, and they did but I think everyone deserved it. I hope mother will be okay by herself."

"She refused to live here, Draco. I even took her aside and tried to convince her but she said no. She said she has her house elves there with her and since the ministry went in and did away with all the Dark stuff… she just wants to be where your dad resided."

"I know, I just want her to be alright."

"I understand. We'll make sure to visit her often. I hope Ginny is doing okay, maybe we should do a dinner this weekend. Try and move everyone passed this."

"You seem to be doing well," Draco remarked.

"I'm upset about your father, but that's about it. I know I should be sadder about the rest of them, but I'm just much too happy that you survived, and that Harry, Ginny, Pansy and Blaise all lived. I really can't ask for much more than that. The people we lost aided a good cause, since Harry won, and Harry was right, your father really did die a hero."

"I know," Draco sighed, taking Hermione into his arms, "but that doesn't make it hurt any less."

"Of course not, only time will do that."

"Yeah."

"Well, I have something to tell you that might cheer you up, and I know for a fact it will cheer your mother up," Hermione said, smirking in a very Malfoy-ish way.

"Oh yeah? And what's that? I was thinking maybe dinner before you said it would cheer up my mother too."

"Always a man, thinking with his stomach," Hermione joked, leaning away from him so she could see his face, "But in all seriousness, I'm pregnant."

Draco didn't say a word, he just stared at her, wide eyed and terrified looking.

For a moment, until he managed to clear his throat and say, "Pr… Pregnant?"

"Yes."

"How pregnant?"

Hermione laughed, of all the things and questions to hear come out of his mouth, she was not expecting him to use quite those words.

"Two months."

"Two months?! You mean you were fighting in that damned war while pregnant?! Have you been to a healer? We need to go to a healer."

And Draco actually started to retie his tie and move to the door.

"Draco! It's 6 PM, there's no healer we can go to right now, and of course I went to a healer, I'm not a moron."

"You fought a war while pregnant!"

"A couple weeks pregnant. Everything is fine!"

Draco seemed to be on one track though and continued toward the door, mumbling about going to see the healer. Hermione sighed and put her flats back on quickly and followed him out of the house, grabbing onto his arm before he disapparated to St. Mungos.

"Oh, should you even be apparating?" he asked aimlessly, before moving forward to the desk and demanding to see a healer for his possibly pregnant wife.

"Name?"

"Draco Malfoy."

The receptionist raised an eyebrow at him, " _Her_ name?"

"Hermione Malfoy."

"My records state that she was just here yesterday, and her healer was… Mr. Williamson. He's on shift right now, if you'll just take a seat he'll be with you as soon as possible."

Draco wandered over to the waiting area and sat gracefully on a couch, still freaking out slightly. Hermione was unsure what he was getting all flustered about, just the fact that she was pregnant, or the fact that she was two weeks pregnant while fighting in the war. She sat beside him but didn't say a word until Healer Williamson ushered them into his office and turned to face them.

"Back so soon, Mrs. Malfoy?"

"My husband seems to be having a slight breakdown," Hermione said, trying not to laugh.

"Do the test," he said, wide eyed.

Healer Williamson didn't usually take orders from patients or waste hospital time and supplies, but he agreed to redo the test. Hermione laid back on the table and bared her stomach and the doctor leaned down with a potion in his hand, not a potion to be consumed, but instead he rubbed it on Hermione's stomach, and it immediately glowed white.

"White means pregnant, Mr. Malfoy," the healer said seriously, turning to look at him.

"And how do you know how far along she is?"

At his question a 9 burned in the air above her stomach.

"Nine? Nine what?!"

"Nine weeks, Mr. Malfoy," Healer Williamson said while Hermione took a deep breath.

"That means you were three weeks pregnant during the war! How can we tell if everything with the baby is okay?"

The healer took his wand in his hand and an image appeared in mid-air, a tiny organism, probably only a couple centimeters, was flickering in the air.

"As far as we can tell at this point, everything is fine. Honestly, Mr. Malfoy, if anything wasn't fine, your wife would have miscarried."

Draco seemed extremely relieved all of a sudden and a large grin broke out on his face.

"Here's a pamphlet to keep you informed, as well as the major do's and don'ts of pregnancy. Mrs. Malfoy, we need you here in another four weeks for another checkup, just to ensure that everything is going smoothly."

"And what about our blood bond? Will it affect anything?"

"No, Sir."

"And is Hermione allowed to apparate?"

"She can for now. That information is in the pamphlet, but I will let you know it will be safe for her to apparate until her third trimester."

"Thank you, Healer Williamson," Draco said sincerely, as the man excused himself.

"My mother is going to be beyond excited. If only my father were here to be a grandfather…"

Hermione pulled down her shirt and moved to her husband, putting her hand gently on his shoulder. He leaned his face down and kissed her tenderly, trying to put as much emotion into it as he could, letting her know how happy and excited he was.

They broke apart and Draco grinned down at her.

"If someone would have told me that after such a sad morning, surrounded by grieving people at a war memorial that the ministry made to honour those who had fallen, I would be so beyond happy, I would have given them my trademark sneer and called them a moron."

Hermione laughed slightly and took Draco's hand, leading him home.

"Something isn't right," Draco said, the second they were standing outside their front door. He held Hermione behind him with one arm as he opened the door and was instantly relieved to see his four best friends sitting in their living area, draped on the couches as though they lived there.

"Don't scare me like that!" Draco snapped, stepping in and again, loosening his tie, "I've got precious cargo here, you know."

"What do you mean?"

"Sorry, Draco."

"Precious how?"

"My wife is pregnant, and she will now have to deal with the overbearing husband I'm going to be, because I will not let anything happen to her."

"Pregnant?" Harry said, almost reminiscent of Draco an hour earlier.

Both Pansy and Ginny squealed loudly before jumping up and pulling Hermione into a tight hug.

"Wow, good job, mate!" Blaise said, with such gusto someone would think a man had never impregnated his wife before.

Draco beamed.


End file.
